Academics

Promoting Child Development and Learning

Because we have formal education and experience providing us with knowledge of children’s cognitive, physical, social, and emotional needs, we have a professional foundation for developing a nurturing environment for young children to learn and grow.

Building Family and Community Relationships

You know your child best, so we include you as an expert resource and relationship by involving you and your community–honoring all community and family diversity–in your child’s development.

Observing, Documenting, and Assessing to Support Young Children and Families

We provide professional observations with documentation for assessing developmental goals of your child.  This may be identifying social interaction goals, learning tool needs per learning style, fine-motor control abilities, speech patterns aligning with maturation, and other needs your family or child may have.  Authentic Assessment Portfolios are created digitally to gather work samples and observations on a continuous basis and use California’s Desired Results Developmental Profile (DRDP) as a framework for learning domain objectives.

Using Developmentally Effective Approaches

Understanding how positive relationships and supportive interactions lay the foundation for your child’s trust and cooperation in his/her learning and care, we apply our early childhood education experience to your child’s learning style and level to create a joyful and abundant learning environment with stimulating educational tools and strategies.

Using Content Knowledge to Build Meaningful Curriculum

Beyond knowledge acquisition, learning develops the unique aspirations and joy each child holds within his or her self.  Curriculum, materials, teaching and learning approaches, and the environment has been developed to nurture your child as an individual, as part of a community, and here, as part of our extended family.

“…young children are developing not only early language and reading skills but also the desire to communicate, read and write. They are developing not only early math and science skills and concepts but also the motivation to solve problems…Children’s development in the social, emotional and cognitive functioning domains – developing independence, responsibility, self-regulation and cooperation – can be critical to success in the transition to school and in the early grades.” -NAEYC Professional Standards

Circle Time

If you have ever watched the educational television show, Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood, then you will know understand what inspires our Circle Time! At 9:30am we gather to sit as a group.  Circle Time, in general terms, consists of individual sharing, a preview of our topic, a story or activity with group conversation or interaction, and … Continue reading Circle Time

STEM – Science, Technology, Engineering, Math

Facilitating the STEM subjects is just as fun as learning them! Avalon’s “high F.I.V.E.S” structure for STEM lessons are:  Fun–activities are often through games or inspiring activities.  Interactive–children physically and mentally interact with the material or activity. Varied–monthly themes give changing context for building a foundation of STEM understanding. Engaging–children engage with each other, the … Continue reading STEM – Science, Technology, Engineering, Math

Arts and Crafts

Stick figures are to be treasured.  Paint smears to be admired.  An ice-sculpture with colored salts to be fun and playful. The curricula for arts and crafts enables children to learn how to use  a variety of mediums (crayons, paint, clay, glue, etc.) for both process-style art (emphasis on free expression with medium/materials) and product-based … Continue reading Arts and Crafts

Music and Performance

Singing, playing instruments, movements or dancing to music, or role-play performance, is done daily! A wide variety of child-sized instruments is provided for both the self-directed and structured learning: piano, drums, xylophone, ukulele, maracas, bells, and more. Each month we learn a new song that is connected to one of the learning themes or to … Continue reading Music and Performance

Literacy and Language

The best way for children to develop literacy and language skills is to…(drumroll please)…read and talk with them as much as possible!  Reading builds phonological awareness (matching sounds to written letters) and talking with them builds phonemic awareness (matching sounds to letters orally)–both of these increase your child’s vocabulary and intelligence! Reading Stories are read … Continue reading Literacy and Language