CURRICULUM

Curriculum Overview

The total growth of the child is our goal. We believe through love and acceptance, learning is naturally fostered. Our children learn through play, but all activities have an educational objective and purpose. CUMP is a happy place to be, where children can gain the independence needed to tackle the amazing world around them. Come and see all we have to offer.

Creative Curriculum

CUMP believes children learn best through doing. We use The Creative Curriculum for Preschool as our comprehensive early childhood educational system. Creative Curriculum uses a preschooler’s environment to help them grow in the four areas of child development: cognitive, social/emotional, physical and language. A classroom set-up in centers, or interest areas, allows a child to explore, create and experiment with their own interests.

The teacher’s role in Creative Curriculum is to be the facilitator. She actively engages the children in the centers, modeling ways to use the manipulatives, fostering an environment where exploration is valued and most importantly forming a positive, loving relationship with each child. The teacher talks with each child, asking open ended questions that allow a child to explain their thinking. At CUMP we strive to be able to answer the question, “How is each of our children special?”

For more information on Creative Curriculum you can visit the website www.TeachingStrategies.com

What are Centers?

The key to sparking a child’s interest is to constantly change the activities presented to them. Through the use of centers, like activities grouped together in interest areas, teachers can provide new materials to guide learning. The center model allows the teacher to ask questions, extend learning and interact with the students in a small group setting. CUMP’s curriculum sheets, which are sent home to the parents, outline each center in the classroom and how the teachers vary the materials used.

Christian Education

CUMP/K provides a safe place for our young children to grow spiritually. Our teachers model Christian character as they love and accept all children who walk through our doors. Pastor Sara Smith, leads our weekly Chapel time and is our Chaplin at CUMP/K. Chapel time promotes spiritual emphasis using hands-on Bible stories and songs. Seasonally, the entire school rotates through Christian centers in our Prayer Chapel. For example, at Christmas the nativity story comes to life as our children retell the true meaning of Christmas using costumes, puppets, puzzles, art activities and play sets. In the classroom, we incorporate Bible stories into curriculum and say a blessing before snack and lunch.

Literacy and Mathematics

At CUMP, we pride ourselves on the emphasis we put on early literacy and pre-reading skills. Our story time focuses on the parts of a story (character, setting, problem and solution), vocabulary introduction, comprehension and retelling. All ages participate in shared reading where the teacher leads a daily mini lesson using a short poem to highlight specific skills (letter identification, sight word recognition, etc.) Building competence in math is another goal at CUMP. Our classrooms offer numerous opportunities throughout the day to promote mathematical thinking. Our curriculum focuses on the 5 key components of math: number concepts, patterns, geometry, measurement and graphing. Math comes alive through PLAY. For example, when our children build towers in our block centers, they are recognizing simple geometric shapes and gaining spatial sense. Counting how tall the tower is or comparing their tower to their friends builds beginning number concepts. Rote counting and one-to-one correspondence is practiced through songs and finger plays with our younger students and through calendar time and games with our older ones. Learning can and should be FUN!

Specials

Built into our preschool day is also time for artistic expression, physical education, technology, dramatic arts, science, and chapel.

During Library special, children will have story time, ABC play, and an opportunity to check-out books to bring home and read.

Our Toddlers have Music where they sing and dance with scarves, ribbons, parachutes, and hoops strengthening their gross motor skills and having fun in the process. Simple songs and finger plays will be learned and enjoyed along with seasonal music and songs. Listening and interacting with songs with lyrics helps build vocabulary and speech, while also forming preceding skills.

Technology

One of the Specials that the children of CUMP/K attend each week is Technology. Ms. Linda Shawcross uses the Hatch SmartBoard as a teaching tool to reinforce much of the curriculum being taught in the classroom. The Hatch SmartBoard is an interactive board, similar to a giant tablet, that allows the children to write, work, and learn in a hands on manner. With access to many online learning apps, and the opportunity to create some of her own lessons using the Hatch applications, Ms. Linda works with all age levels at CUMP/K to extend and reinforce classroom learning.

Thanks to a very successful fundraiser and a generous donation, CUMP/K has also been able to add at least one tablet to each of the classrooms in the 2’s, 3’s,4’s, Pre-K, and iPads for the Kindergarten. This enables the classroom teachers to take advantage of many online reading opportunities and short video clips to reinforce a science or social studies concep

Science

Twos, Threes, Fours, Pre-K, and Kindergarten will all go to Ms. Annette each week for their Science special. In Science, they will cover all three components of science: earth and the environment, life science, and physical science. The big topics we delve into will be the five senses, forces of motion and simple machines, living/nonliving, and the insect world.