Of all the ingredients in a high-quality program, a curriculum that recognizes the value of child-initiated active learning is the most important. The best early childhood activities build on children’s natural curiosity, are matched to children’s current and emerging abilities, and allow for exploration and variation rather than having to perform in a single “right way.” Learning is a process of “developmental change” — that is, a process in which we learn by relating and adding new information to what we already know, and if necessary, changing the way we thought before. Learning does not happen when children are simply told something. To learn, they must see and do things for themselves, with parents and teachers present to encourage and challenge their thinking. Children must be secure and confident in what they already know before they are ready to move to the next level.
When HighScope says adults support and extend children’s learning, it means that the adults first validate, or support, what children already know, and then challenge them to extend their thinking to the next level.
A Comprehensive Curriculum
In the HighScope Preschool Curriculum, learning is focused on the following eight content areas, which are based on the dimensions of school readiness identified by the National Education Goals Panel. HighScope's curriculum content areas are:
Approaches to learning
Social and emotional development
Physical development and health
Language, literacy, and communication
Mathematics
Creative arts
Science and technology
Social studies
While learning in these content areas prepares children for later schooling, HighScope takes the learning process beyond traditional academic subjects by applying methods that promote independence, curiosity, decision making, cooperation, persistence, creativity, and problem solving in young children.
Pee Wee Patch Child Development Center
1796 S Lapeer Rd
Lake Orion, MI 48360
(248) 814-1010
peeweepatch.com