PRE-K

“Teach the children so it will not be necessary to teach the adults.”

Abraham Lincoln

Pre-K for the 4 Year Olds

Holmdel Preschool teachers stimulate children through spontaneous and reciprocal interactions.

They’re taller, more coordinated and more attentive: they’re 4 year olds and their individual personalities are starting to shine. Four-year-olds start to develop a sense of humor that they’ll enjoy sharing by telling silly jokes. This is the time when imaginary friends may be introduced, as well as repetitive imaginary games. They also begin to tell ‘little’ lies in order to keep from getting in trouble. Be prepared for plenty of little tests, as they’ll start to say and do things simply to gauge your reaction. It’s also not unusual for this age group to start asserting themselves, becoming a little bossy. Tattling becomes a favorite pastime, too. Of course, it’s always important to remember that children develop at different rates.
At Holmdel Preschool, we offer integrated approaches to our curriculum with real life contexts, meaningful experiences and opportunities for learning. Discovery learning is provided in both small groups and by independent learning experiences. We are believers that all a school can do and needs to do for their students is to develop their ability to think. We work on the 4 C’s skills with all students: critical thinking, creativity, collaboration and communication, to achieve independent thinking, along with following the The Creative Curriculum®

Some of the areas of focus are:

  • Develop an awareness of print and refine handwriting skills
  • Appreciate the importance of the written word
  • Recognize common words
  • Recognize initial consonant sounds
  • Recognize rhyming word families
  • Refine skills in cooperative play
  • Understand and appreciate concepts of friendship
  • Develop an awareness of the Nation as a whole and its integral parts
  • Understand regions of the USA
  • Develop an awareness of mapping
  • Develop an awareness of national events and their importance
  • Appreciate cultures and their characteristics
  • Explore and understand concepts of seasons
  • Understand concepts of weather and weather patterns
  • Understand concepts of living and non-living
  • Understand concepts of habitants and environments
  • Understand concepts of time
    • Day & night
    • Months of the year
    • Days of the week
  • Walking, running, playing catch, and other physical activities designed for their age group.
  • Writing letters of the alphabet
  • Stacking a tower at least 10 blocks high
Pre-K2

At four years old you’ll probably see some, if not all of the following milestones come to pass:

  • Singing silly songs, making up silly words and beginning to make rhymes.
  • Follow simple unconnected directions
  • Changing the way they talk to different age groups (using shorter sentences with younger siblings)
  • Pronounces most sounds correctly, still has trouble with s, w and r sounds
  • Ask for the meaning of new words
  • Makes up stories, talks about current thoughts
  • Argues, even when it’s not a logical argument
  • Sharing, cooperating, taking turns
  • Acting bossy
  • Telling silly jokes, laughing and silly things
  • Telling small likes to avoid getting into trouble
  • Saying and doing inappropriate things simply to gauge a reaction
  • Having and playing with imaginary friends
  • Comprehending the difference between make-believe and reality
  • Grasp how pictures and symbols represent real things
  • Learn how ideas relate, starting to use words like ‘if’ and ‘when’ to express them
  • Thinking in logical steps, understanding the logical consequence of things
  • Understands abstract thoughts like “bigger, “less”, “later”, “ago” and “soon”
  • Places items in order (big to small, short to tall)
  • Focuses on an activity for 10 to 15 minutes
  • Gross Motor Skills
    • Walking, running and learning to jump with both feet
    • Easier movement control, such as stopping, starting, turning, avoiding obstacles
    • Greater variation of physical activities such as somersaults, skip & trot, etc.
    • Dressing with minimal assistance (zippers & snaps may still be difficult)
    • Throwing and bouncing a ball
    • Jumping and climbing
    • Pedaling and / or steering a tricycle or bicycle
  • Fine Motor Skills
    • Drawing or copying basic shapes
    • Using scissors
    • Stacking a tower at least 10 blocks high
    • Stringing beads or similar items to make a necklace
    • Shape clay / play-dough into recognizable creations
  • Develop an appreciation for authors, themes, and types of literature
  • Understand concepts of phoneme awareness
  • Have a large bank of nursery rhymes and finger play songs
  • Have a concept of left/right orientation and configuration
  • Identify and print numbers
  • Understand relationships between numbers
  • Develop abilities to problem solve using manipulatives
  • Develop awareness for ordering data and information through graphing
  • Sorting, patterning, graphing, estimation, and comparing
  • Recognizing numbers in sequence
  • Basic concepts of geometry and symmetry
  • Understand concepts of less than, greater than, and equal to

Before and After School Program

Our before-and-after school childcare program is available from 7am to 7pm for all children attending Holmdel Preschool. For parents who want or need extra time for their children outside of the class, we offer a familiar surrounding with familiar adults. At Holmdel Preschool, there is supervised indoor and outdoor play (weather permitting,) learning and socialization, in a safe and secure environment.

Our Learning Environments include:

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