Our Curriculum

CBI Preschool & Kindergarten supports the growth of young children through a developmental, play-based curriculum which recognizes and addresses the individual growth and needs (social, emotional, physical, spiritual, and cognitive) of students and creates opportunities to allow each child to grow at his or her own pace.

At CBI, we believe that children are individual learners; each one gaining skills at their own pace and responding to different styles and methods of teaching. Our philosophy centers itself on the whole child. We aim to nurture and strengthen each child's social, emotional, cognitive, and physical abilities throughout our program. We believe that children learn through active play and exploration in a multi-sensory environment and supported a developmentally appropriate curriculum so they can:

• learn to trust themselves and others
• learn self-discipline
• gain an awareness of others and the ability to feel for and with them
• become self-reliant and self-starting
• become increasingly responsible for their own behavior and safety
• form creative ideas
• extend basic moving, manipulating, and communicating skills
• listen with heightened and prolonged attentiveness
• acquire factual information
• develop the capacity to conceptualize and represent ideas
• derive pleasure from the process as well as the product
• show the desire to try, the courage to fail, and the persistence to continue their effort

Social & Emotional Development
At CBI Preschool & Kindergarten our primary focus is on developing social and emotional skills in our students. These skills are critical to a young child's development. By providing a variety of situations in which children interact with their peers, we work to build social skills such as sharing and teamwork.

School is a place for making friends and learning what friendship means. At the beginning of the year, teachers help the children develop friendships with their classmates. Children learn to use problem solving and negotiation skills to resolve conflicts and are encouraged to use their skills in the classroom. The preschool day is carefully designed to promote independence. The children hang their own coats and backpacks when they arrive at school, set the table at snack time, clean-up the classroom together, and help care for classroom plants and pets.

Creative Arts
Art is an important and daily part of our curriculum, giving children the opportunity to develop socially, cognitively, and physically. As our students create, they express feelings, assert individuality, experience pride, share, and cooperate.

Children are exposed to a wide variety of materials and techniques. From painting with feathers and matchbox cars to paper mache and modeling clay, children are encouraged to freely explore and create. Art experiences help our students develop an understanding of cause and effect, develop planning skills, and solve problems: "What happens when I mix yellow and blue?" These experiences help our students develop fine motors skills and hand-eye coordination.

Language & Literacy Development
The concept of written language is explored in a natural way as children dictate stories to teachers, "pretend write," and listen to books at story time. We take a whole language approach to literacy development. You might see a class reading a story, retelling the story, acting it out, and then inventing new versions of the story. This approach keeps learning language interesting and challenging and provides children with well-rounded exposure to all pieces of literacy. From our youngest students through our kindergarteners, rhymes, poems, and fingerplays are used to promote the pre-reading skills of phonemic awareness and vocabulary development.

Scientific Discovery
At CBI Preschool & Kindergarten we strive to foster the development of cognitive thinking skills: problem solving, questioning, reasoning, and experimenting. Science experiences offer real life opportunities for development in these areas. Asking questions and finding the answers are an integral part of children's lives. Children will experience science through rich sensory experiences that incorporate observation, hypothesizing, problem solving, analysis, discovery, and exploration. Entry points for these explorations include items within our environment including the exploration of worms, insects, water & ice, Tu B'Shevat (the birthday of the trees), and color.

Mathematical & Logical Thinking
Mathematical curiosity is natural in young children. We encourage this by providing a balanced curriculum of play activities that develop mathematical sense. Mathematical awareness begins with our youngest students and develops throughout the early childhood years. Skills like counting, and classifying by size, color, and attributes are introduced using a variety of manipulatives and play experiences.

Other areas of study are incorporated directly into our daily activities: geometric shapes, number recognition, matching numbers to objects, and measurement. We encourage our students to experiment with a variety of math and science concepts during sand play, cooking, building and block play.

Physical Development
Puzzles, play dough, Legos, beads, cutting, writing, drawing, and gluing all help to encourage fine motor development. These activities are a daily part of our curriculum. To develop large motor skills, balance and coordination, children work on such skills as throwing a ball, hopping, skipping, running, climbing, and marching.

Our youngest students use our outdoor courtyard space for sand play, riding bikes, cooperative games, blowing bubbles, picnics, and chalk drawing. Our older students walk to McGuffey Park where they swing, climb trees, play basketball and baseball, have picnics, slide, climb, and play together. On rainy days, we use bikes, parachutes, and music in our large social hall to teach skills in body awareness, self-confidence, and independence. Each day, using imagination and creativity, the children learn to express themselves through movement, fostering life-long routines of physical fitness.

Music
Music is an important part of our day. Our teachers use music to greet the children and to transition them between activities throughout the day. Songs and musical movement activities are incorporated into circle and freeplay times. Our music program also includes music classes focusing on singing, simple prayers, rhythm, sequence, and beat. We use a wide variety of traditional children's rhymes and songs in Hebrew and English to allow students to explore the elements of music and develop an ability to express themselves through music and movement.

The students will:

• Experience a variety of Jewish music, including traditional and modern, folk and liturgical, Hebrew, Israeli, and chanted prayers
• Experience a variety of American music and music from around the world
• Develop a musical repertoire of Jewish and traditional American songs
• Begin learning the concepts of beat, rhythm, pitch, sequence, and patterns
• Develop an appreciation for music as a vehicle for creative expression
• Practice using movement to explore musical concepts
• Experience music as a tool for cognitive, emotional, social, linguistic, and physical growth and development
• Experience music as joyful and fun