Kindergarten

Kindergarten children at The Philadelphia School take a big step from preschool into the wider school community. Their world expands from self and family into a more complex world of peers, groups, and school. This builds the foundation for social maturity and academic learning while remaining responsive to the here-and-now of the young child's experience.

Kindergartners take this expanding social world and run with it. Life for 5- and 6-year-olds is good – it is a time of great happiness and big emotions. The children start to develop strong bonds with special friends, can have hurt feelings easily, and often cannot see things from someone else’s perspective. This makes kindergarten a perfect place to focus on community, communication, and social skills.

Learning is at its best for kindergarteners when it is both structured and exploratory: structured through a clear and predictable schedule, exploratory through carefully constructed areas of interest where children can initiate their own wonderings, follow their own hunches, and create their own activities.

Academic activities are open-ended and individualized.  While academics receive greater emphasis  in kindergarten than in preschool, we still recognize the importance of play for the children.. Our students are given time for indoor and outdoor play every day. Children are active constructors of knowledge, and unstructured play not only offers a platform for such construction, it offers teachers insights into the growth and development of the students.

Our Country Classroom at the Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education (SCEE) becomes part of our students’ weekly schedule in kindergarten. Children are natural investigators – as they try to make sense of the world, wonder how things work and grow, and develop hypotheses and theories. SCEE gives our city kids an opportunity to develop a deep connection with nature and the outdoor world.

     
   
   
   
   

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