Why 4K?
To improve academic success and close achievement gaps, research heavily documents the benefits of an early learning program for children. The combination of a nurturing environment and learning activities has a lasting effect on children’s school success.
On Our Way with 4K Today!
The children at St. John Bosco are engaged in highly interactive indoor and outdoor activities that encourage them to explore the world around them while learning important skills that will prepare them for Kindergarten.
The St. John Bosco 4 Year Old Kindergarten Program:
- Provides learning opportunities through play-based instruction
- Taught by a licensed Department of Public Instruction teacher with specialization in early childhood education
- The student to adult ratio is 10:1
- Children must be four years old on or before September 1 of each year
Half Day and Full Day Options
Beginning during the 2022-2023 school year, families will have the choice between half day (8 a.m.-11:30 a.m.) or full day (8 a.m.-3 p.m.) 4K. Each semester families can choose if their student will attend half days or full days.
All academic learning activities will take place in the mornings. Afternoons will include lunch, recess, rest time and additional supplemental activities, such as story time or independent centers.
4K Goals
- Develop a love of learning
- Identify letters (upper and lowercase) and sounds
- Identify numbers and shapes
- Beginning stages of reading
- Develop good self-image
- Awareness of others in relationship to self
- Become independent
- Develop social skills
- Be able to share
- Develop communication
- Develop physically, intellectually, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually
Curriculum Information
Creative Curriculum
The philosophy behind our curriculum is that young children learn best by doing. Learning requires active thinking and experimenting to find out how things work. Children explore the world around them by using all their senses: touching, tasting, listening, smelling, and looking.
Gradually children become more able to use abstract symbols like words to describe their thoughts and feelings. They learn to “read” pictures, which are symbols of real people, places, and things. This exciting development in symbolic thinking takes place during the pre-school years as children play. Play provides the foundation for academic or “school” learning. It is the preparation children need before they learn highly abstract symbols such as letters (which are symbols for sounds) and numbers (which are symbols for number concepts). Play enables us to achieve the key goals of our early childhood curriculum. Play is the work of young children.
4K makes transitioning into full day kindergarten easier and the skills learned will allow more time for actual instruction. Examples:
- Children will already know how to get their jackets on or off
- Put their folder in their school bag
- Share with a classmate
- Raise their hand before answering a question, etc.
Reading
Your child’s earliest years are key for developing a solid foundation (and love) for reading. Children will have story time daily where the teacher reads a book to them. This builds a desire for reading that is critical for future success in their educational journey. Puppets are used to act out stories. Imaginative play and dramatic interpretation are encouraged in various centers. We use colorful books, sand/water tables, and easels to practice letters and encourage emergent reading skills.
Learning centers and individualized time fosters the student’s growth. Our students receive individualized instruction from the teacher on a weekly basis.
Physical Education/Music
Our students have specialized physical education and music classes four times a week. Students develop and refine their use of small and gross motor skills through games, sports, singing, dancing, rhythms, and listening.
Math
Students learn math concepts daily using manipulatives and fun activities, which develop critical thinking skills. Our program has students sorting, identifying shapes, and creating patterns, understanding position words, comparing numbers, measuring, and estimating.
Technology
Our 4K program has iPads in the classroom. Different apps contribute to cognitive development and intervention strategies.
Instructive apps use repetition and encourage proper letter formation and letter sounds. These apps use a variety of ways for our students to learn and recognize the information. Children will generally play for 6-7 minutes and then move on to another game.
Constructive apps allow our students to use a high level of both cognitive involvement and development. These types of apps often have an open-ended component to the activity.
