Our Philosophy
The Keiki O Lana‘i Preschool program provides a developmentally age-appropriate learning environment for all children enrolled. This means that the curriculum and adult interaction are responsive to individual differences in children's interests, attention spans, developmental level and learning style.
We believe that children are active learners. The major activity for your child is PLAY and it is the basic ingredient of all learning. The classroom environment is set up through learning centers to stimulate children's natural curiosity and hands-on interaction with materials and people. This is also they way in which young children develop an understanding of themselves, of others, and the world around them.
We are not concerned with the traditional products of learning, for example, the recitation of alphabet, but rather, we are concerned with the process of learning. Children learn through active, spontaneous play with physical and social environments. From ages 2-8, a child is developing many of the cognitive skills that are the foundation of formal learning. Generally, a child is ready for formal learning by age seven. Attempts to hurry a child's cognitive stages of development are futile. Children need to be encouraged and challenged at every stage, without being pushed or stressed to learn skills for which they are not yet ready. Our goal is to help foster the development of a child's thinking skills by giving him/her meaningful opportunities to experiment, explore, questions, and play.
It is important for young children to trust adults to be sensitive and appropritely responsive to their needs. Children also need to develop self-help skills, take their own initiative in relating to and interacting with their environment, and have opportunities to make decisions and solve problems. Our early childhood program also provides important socializing experiences. We provide opportunities for children to develop the skills needed to relate to peers and adults in ways that are constructive and emotionally satisfying.
Each child is unique. All children bring to this experience their own patterns of growth and development, their own abilities, experiences, backgrounds, and perceptions. As children develop skills, they gain a sense of competence. We try to provide experiences and give feedback that enables each child to experience success and continued motivation to learn and develop. We must recognize both the strengths and weaknesses of each child and provide activities that build upon the competencies and mitigate the weaknesses. Children learn most effectively when the learning experience we provide builds on their knowledge and experience.
Curriculum
On the basis of the philosophies of the school as described in this handbook, our curriculum is developmentally age-appropriate. In addition to attending to the developmental needs of the child in areas of social, emotional, physical, and cognitive growth, our curriculum also encourages children to use positive and appropriate ways to resolve conflicts. We are also committed to incorporating multi-cultural, anti-bias, and non-sexist learning experiences into our daily curriculum. Our anti-bias curriculum is supported by a wide variety of bias-free books, dolls, and other learning materials.
Parents are encouraged to contribue to the curriculum by sharing ideas or materials with the teachers. Often parents have special skills or knowledge of interest to the children. The bond between home and school is inseparable. Teachers and parents must work together to provide the best learning and growth experience for children. We welcome parent involvement in our classrooms.
We believe the preschool must provide a stimulating environment where children are free and encourage engaging in a variety of learning experiences. The classrooms are set up with learning centers as well as teacher directed activities. Learning centers include creative arts, language, arts, math, manipulative, building and construction, science, listening, music and dramatic play. We also include cooking activities. Children need to be children and given the opportunity to explore and discover the world through all their sense. That's the kind of learning experience we encourage at Keiki O Lana‘i Preschool.
Specific weekly lesson plans are available for parents to review in each classroom. Parent newsletters are distributed at the beginning of each month with information concerning classroom activities, school events and policy updates. Monthly activities calendars will be given to each family. These calendars name at least one specific daily activity that will allow parents to talk about at home with their child.
Guidance Practices and Policies
People often equate discipline with punishment. Our view takes a somewhat different approach to the concept of discipline. We talk about discipline as one element of guidance. Guidance refers to all the activities and interaction that serve to enhance each child's self-control and positive interactions. Part of the role of our program is to assist young children in the development of skills needed to relate to peers and other adults in appropriate, constructive, and healthy ways. We try to accomplish these goals in a number of ways.
1. Environment. We try to provide an environment that meets children's needs and minimizes frustrations. We provide a variety of stimulating activities daily and have developmentally-appropriate materials.
2. Modeling. We expect that children will grow in self-control and respect for others by watching adults behave in positive, supportive, cooperative, and meaningful interactions. Children will imitate the social behavior of adults they admire.
3. Identification. We know that children want to become like those people who express warmth and support. Children also want to become like those people that are important to them. Through identification, children take as their own, the values and attitude of those who they admire. In the preschool, guidance occurs through each child's identification with the ideals of the teachers.
4. Explanation. Children may not always understand the implications of their behaviors for others. They may not anticipate that something which makes them happy may make another child sad or that an action that makes them feel strong causes another child pain. Adults contribute to guidance by explaining the consequences of a child's behavior and by pointing out the impact of the behavior on others.
5. Problem Solving. We know that children want to be independent and have their decisions respected. We encourage children to test out their ideas and we provide a setting where their creativity can be used to help fit the needs of each other and the group.
6. Redirection. When children are engaged in behaviors that are harmful to themselves or to others in the classroom, these behaviors must be limited. However, the feelings or motives that energize the behavior are real. They are immediate to the child and a part of the child's ability to achieve self-understanding. Our approach is to try to understand the feelings and to find some way to talk about or express the feelings that would not be harmful. Expressions may take place through talking, physical activity, or by having a quiet time away from the situation for thinking things through. Occasionally, in order to help a child regain control, we may both stay with that child and give him/her some supervised and supportive time away in a safe place from the situation until the child feels ready and able to return to play.
7. Natural or Logical Consequences. We know that preschool children need to anticipate what will happen next and understand how their actions affect other people in concrete ways. We explain the logical consequences of a situation (factors that are likely to occur under natural circumstances) and by describing predictable limits, offer the child a choice of actions.
8. Physical Punishment. Physical punishment is not used as a discipline strategy at Keiki O Lana'i Preschool. This means that we do not use spanking, slapping, pinching, shaking, or grabbing. We do not shout at the children, belittle them, or threaten physical harm. We do not confine a child to an area where he/she would be totally alone without adult supervision.
A central mechanism for development within the preschools settings are the bond of trust that develops between the child and the teachers. We believe that this bong enables the child to take risks and explore new experiences and ideas. This bond also contributes to the child's ability to act in a caring way toward other children in the class. We believe that physical punishment is destructive to the bond of trust between child and adult. For this reason, we reject physical punishment as a form of discipline.