“What can I do?”

At Harford Friends School kindergarten is the very beginning of a student’s educational adventure.  Children are respected, nurtured and challenged.  They learn that their questions and ideas are valued and welcomed.  We believe in nurturing a child’s natural curiosity, and that learning is most memorable through hands on experiences, and that school should be fun.

Our curriculum is filled with exciting thematic units and educational components that strive to nurture a love for learning, inspire compassion, conflict resolution, community service, and develop a student’s interpersonal and intrapersonal skills.  Students begin to build the emotional and intellectual foundation that they will need for academic excellence, independent thinking, and creative problem solving that will help them throughout life.  Students learn to explore, take healthy risks and master essential skills as they become active valued members in making their world a better place.

Spheres of Learning: Classroom, Schoolyard, Home

Play is a critical feature to advance student achievement and learning.  Learning is hands-on and project oriented rather than just direct instruction.

Year-long Themes: Friendship, Community, Equality, Integrity

Units of Study: Who am I?

What makes me special?

How am I alike and different from others?

What are the parts of my body?

What can I see, hear, smell, feel, and taste?

Mathematics:

Understanding the meanings, uses, and representations of numbers; understanding equivalent names for numbers; understanding common numerical relations; computing accurately (addition and subtraction); understanding meanings of operations; selecting and creating appropriate graphical representations of collected or given data; analyzing and interpreting data; understanding and applying basic concepts of probability; understanding the systems and process of measurement, and using appropriate techniques, tools, and formulas in making measurements (length, weight, angles, money); using and understanding reference frames (temperature and time); investigating characteristics and properties of two-and three-dimensional geometric shapes; applying transformations and symmetry in geometric situations; understanding patterns and functions; reading and writing expressions and number sentences using the symbols +, -, and = (Everyday Mathematics curriculum, University of Chicago).

Language Arts:

Harford Friends School believes that all children are listeners, speakers, readers, and writers; we learn to listen by listening; we learn to speak by speaking; we learn to read by reading; we learn to write by writing; and that speakers, listeners, readers, and writers change the world and themselves.

With those understandings in mind, the reading curriculum focuses specifically on phonemic awareness, the ability to notice/hear, identify, and manipulate phonemes (individual sounds) in spoken words; phonics, the segmenting of words into phonemic units that the alphabet represents. (When we read we segment — take words apart and blend –put them back together); using many strategies to solve new words; fluency, to read accurately and effortlessly with meaningful phrasing at an appropriate rate; vocabulary, to assimilate new words and choose words in a variety of ways as students listen, speak, read, and write; and text comprehension, to read critically, analyze, synthesize, and evaluate text.

Each year, the language arts build upon the previous year’s skills and experiences. In the early elementary years, the emphasis on “big ideas” changes in complexity and application. Early and heavy emphasis on phonological awareness, alphabetic principles of letter sounds and combinations gives way to multi-syllabic comprehension and decoding skill development. Key listening skills in the realm of vocabulary and comprehension are developed through grades kindergarten through three. However, reading skills are introduced and developed over the same period with greater and greater weight placed on reading. Ultimately, the objective of the early years language arts program is to create automaticity and fluency with the decoding, reading, comprehension, vocabulary usage, and effective communications. Reading (Comprehension Strategies, Fluency, Community of readers), Writing (Writing Strategies – prewriting, writing, responding, revising, editing, publishing, Community of writers, Grammar/Usage, Handwriting), Word Study (Decoding strategies: Phonemic awareness -1^st, Phonics – 1^st, 2^nd, Structural Analysis), Spelling, Vocabulary, and Speaking and Listening constitute the components of Harford Friends School’s language arts framework. Teachers select thematic readings, books, poetry, plays, and other literature to augment, enrich, and engage the themes within units and each grade.