Evergreen Day School believes that children find joy and are successful when they are engaged in play-based experiences with open-ended creative opportunities, with teachers as facilitators in a safe and nurturing environment.

Curriculum

Curriculum

Our Approach

Classrooms are designed to encourage exploration, socialization, and support the unique learning styles of each individual child. Children learn through play and build understanding of the world through a process of inquiry and reflection. The curriculum emerges from their interests, based on the children’s interactions and the teachers’ observations.

Our approach is complementary and draws from multiple educational theories. Our teachers develop a variety of practices to reach every child, following their interests, using materials that are inviting and compelling, with enough time to explore activities at their own pace. This approach allows children to build confidence, become independent learners, and develop their unique personalities.

Most of the work we do everyday is developing social and emotional skills as friends learn how to get along with others, or to share and learn how to compromise. We work on problem solving, building confidence, discovering independence and always find that each child is very capable. We learn how to be respectful of others and our classroom, how to handle frustrations and share our feelings. We feel great pride when we reflect on the many accomplishments and tremendous growth in each and every child!

Enrichment

At Evergreen Day School we include a wide array of enrichment activities in the curriculum. The children look forward to regularly scheduled monthly activities such as ABC Spanish in Motion, Music with Rubi, and Be Ahead of the Game (physical education). In addition, we have special one time events such as visits from Mystic Drumz, Barn Babies, local professionals like firefighters, dentists, doctors, and more!

Toddler Program: 18 Months - 2.8 Years

Toddlers: Orange Room and Yellow Room

Our main priority is to provide a safe, nurturing, and loving environment for children. We want our toddlers to develop a love of learning through hands-on experiences that follow the children’s interests. We recognize that for some children, it is their first experience in a school setting. Children develop language, greater physical capabilities, and a sense of trust for their teachers. Our toddlers are introduced to experiences including art, sensory, early math and science concepts, block building, dramatic play and more!

At the beginning of the year, we focus on separation and the child’s adjustment into a group setting. In addition to engaging open-ended activities, as the year progresses we also focus on emerging self-help skills, promoting positive social interactions with peers, language development, and fostering an increase in self-confidence. In addition, we provide the toddlers with a sense of security by following the routine of our classroom schedule.

Our curriculum is designed to enhance the physical, cognitive, emotional, and social development of each child. We believe that children learn through play, and are presented with opportunities throughout the day to explore, experiment, and engage with the world around them.

Preschool Program: 2.9 - 4 years old

Preschool: Purple Room and Green Room

Our preschoolers are ready to meet the new developmentally appropriate challenges presented to them in our preschool classrooms. Social-emotional development is at the forefront of these experiences. The children are beginning to form deeper bonds with their peers, become comfortable with the routine of a daily schedule, and gain further independence while acquiring new found self-help skills. They are learning to empathize, collaborate, and communicate effectively with peers.

The preschool children learn and grow in a print-rich environment with access to a well established school library. We have an extensive variety of picture books, including a large assortment of multicultural literature. Our preschool classrooms have book corners, writing centers and small and large group experiences to develop their language, literacy and writing skills.

Each classroom is designed to include a block area, writing/art center, dramatic play area, sensory table, book corner, and quiet space. During morning free play, the children are encouraged to visit the centers of their choice to participate in activities that are of interest to them. The teachers set up provocations as suggestions for how the children might engage with the available materials.

In the Block area, children can use a variety of blocks and manipulatives to build structures. Building develops spatial reasoning, fine motor skills, and creativity.

Children have access to a variety of art materials and tools for open-ended, process-focused art activities in the Art and Writing centers. They may explore materials like paint, clay, crayons, markers, collage materials, and more.

In the Dramatic Play area, children engage in role play and imaginative games with props like dress-up clothes, puppets, play food/dishes, dolls, and more. Dramatic play builds narrative skills, social abilities, and emotional intelligence.

A science center is supplied with magnifying glasses, natural findings, experiments and plants, and more! Children regularly form hypotheses based on observations and continue the process by testing out their theories.

Math activities are often subtly incorporated into play activities. We encourage the natural interest a child has with math concepts by building on them through interactive experiences. Patterning, counting and comparing amounts, basic math concepts, learning to recognize numbers and count with one-to -one correspondence are some of the early math concepts introduced in our preschool classrooms.