Preschool Circle Time: PreK Skills for Your Little One

**Very young students or very active children may need to step away, get toys, or move in other ways during our 25 minutes.
This is normal and even necessary for many children.  I will gently encourage them to return when they are ready. In time, you will find that your learner has more stamina to focus on our activities. I will continue interacting and instructing the other students, so feel free to keep the classroom open. **

3 and 4 year olds are very different! In a traditional setting, they would be in separate classes. I have found that they do really well together in the online format. 
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**Parents: I have received so many requests for additional time slots. Thank you! I appreciate it! If you have a request, please specify the times in EST. I am keeping track of the most requested times and have opened new sections in response.**

Also, this class is billed weekly. If it looks full for one week, there may be an opening the next week. Some families are planning on taking this class only until their local PreK opens. 

I am also keeping these groups intentionally small. Although I could add more to each class, I don't think that will benefit the children. I want them to get to know their peers and learn to engage with them.
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If your child hasn't been in online classes or in a traditional preschool, please know that it may take a few sessions for him/her to get comfortable. Some children may prefer to have a stuffed friend with them for comfort. That is always allowed!

This class will meet 3 times a week to provide both consistency and flexibility to your schedule. It is offered on an ongoing basis, which means you can book one week at a time. 

The ongoing format keeps the price affordable and the small size helps us become better acquainted.

My teaching style: I am calm and patient. I am very approachable for those students who are shy, anxious, or new to online learning or to school. 

I attach files in the classroom tab at times. These are optional! It may be a coloring sheet, a recommended book, or an activity suggestion.

You will also notice that calendar time will change throughout the year. Developmentally, most students are not quite ready for a traditional review of the calendar. We will talk about these skills, but they will not be a large part of our time. ________________________________________________

I will expose the learners to a variety of skills and topics. Preschool isn't always about mastery of those skills. I hope to help them work on the following throughout the year: 

-Increased social skills
-ability to introduce themselves
-recognize all 26 uppercase letters (Maybe some small ones, too!)
-starting to make connections between letters and sounds
-colors
-shapes
-body parts
-identifying 0-10, exposing them to 11-20
-counting objects in a group

-All students move through these skills at a different pace and age. 
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We will follow this general routine in each class:


-Welcome: I will encourage the children to say their names, ages, and answer a question. 

-Sing: We will sing or chant songs. Movement is encouraged! We will jump, hop, march, clap, stomp, wave, and turn to work on our large motor skills. 

-Learn: We will look at numbers, colors, shapes, days of the week, the weather, or other math/science topics. (Calendar activities will build throughout the year. I will have a linear calendar format posted in my room.) 

-Listen: We will hear a short story or poem that I will read aloud. (These will get slightly longer as we progress through the year.)

-Move: We will act out fingerplays, chants, or songs. These work our large and small motor skills. I have planned many traditional, familiar choices for August and September to add a layer of comfort for the students. (Row, Row, Row Your Boat, Mary Had a Little Lamb, Itsy Bitsy Spider, etc.)

-Learn: I will have a brief language mini-lesson, which may include a theme ( bugs, food, etc.), letter sounds, words, or rhymes. These learn sections will be very brief in the first several weeks. They will become longer and more involved as the year progresses. (I always encourage tactile objects for your learner as we meet.)

-Listen: Phonological awareness time. This will start as a very, very short section and get longer throughout the year. You will notice that this will usually involve no visuals, purely listening. (so, so important for their reading skills)

-Dismissal: We will politely say good-bye to each of our new friends as we sing a good-bye song.

*Some days we may do more, some days less. 
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Each month my stories, songs, and activities will be loosely based around these topics (may change in response to learners' interests). We will always work on counting, numbers, rhymes, and letters. 

August topics: insects, summer foods 

September topics: vehicles, leaves (more academic content begins such as a letter of the week, number writing)

October topics: community helpers, vegetables (content steps up, I encourage you to have a whiteboard or paper handy for your child.)

November topics: families, meals

December topics: hibernating animals

January topics: hot chocolate, snow

February topics: friendship, helping others, love

March topics: weather, seasons

April topics: baby animals

May topics: flowers, life cycles

June topics: sports

July topics: water, exercise