School Readiness

Preparing your child for school doesn’t just start the year before they go to school or in fact when they are in a 3 -5 room. Here at Little Achievers the developmental goals a child develops over time is to equip each individual child with the knowledge and tools to succeed in all new environments.

Starting school is an exciting period of time for children and their families. Our focus is to help make the transition into a primary school as smooth as possible through supporting the children’s knowledge, ideas and answering their questions about each of their school settings. The evolving school readiness program Little Achievers provides the children is created for children to engage with hands on; interactive experiences on a daily basis.

Our school readiness curriculum incorporates programmed learning opportunities that are child centred experiences throughout the day to day curriculum. Allowing children at Little Achievers to learn, play, grow in their own way with the scaffolding and responsive teaching they need.

We believe in adopting practices that are incorporated into everyday that strengthen children’s readiness for school. The school readiness program was created in conjunction with the Principal at a local Primary school that addresses the developmental goals a child learns prior to school. We bridge the connection of these goals within our daily curriculum which provides ongoing learning opportunities.

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School Readiness Program

The components making up our school readiness program consists of a fine motor program, school readiness topic, phonic awareness and a challenge card each week.

The school readiness topic of the week explores a range of areas:

Correct pencil grasp
Name/colour/shape recognition and writing
Understanding mathematical concepts
Sorting colours and objects
Cutting and pasting
Self help skills

To support the school readiness topic of the week the fine motor program bases the experiences off this topic. The purpose of the fine motor program is for children to learn to use their smaller muscles in their hands, fingers, and wrists. During day-to-day life experiences children use their fine motor skills when writing, holding small items, buttoning clothing, turning pages, eating, cutting with scissors, and using computer keyboards the list can go on and on. Therefore, building on fine motor skills is essential for a child to develop from as young as they can.

Phonic awareness is an ongoing learning cycle that is explored through numerous ways; each week the letter will be explored through writing the letter, an activity related to identifying the letter, and discussion on the sound the letter makes.

The introduction of a challenge card is for the families to explore the school readiness program at home and around the community with their children and then share it with the centre. A similar challenge will be interpreted at the centre and explored for the children to develop the same goal at the challenge set for home.

Transition to school statements

Starting school is a big milestone for children and their families. The transition between learning environments can be both challenging and exciting.

The Transition to School Statement is completed by your child’s educator and is sent to their new school. The statement:

summarises a child’s strengths, interests and approaches to learning
passes this information between families, early childhood educators and teachers
gives children a voice in the process of meeting new people in the school environment
helps link the Early Years Learning Framework to the Early Stage 1 Syllabus

The National Quality Standard (NQS) recognises and reflects on the importance of transition. The standards require early childhood education services to collaborate with service providers and families to achieve quality outcomes for children. It also recognises that continuity of learning is supported by the sharing of information and the clarifying of responsibilities.

Primary Schools acknowledge the transition to school statements and use this prior knowledge as the basis for future learning. Additionally, most schools will conduct early assessments of your child to gain an understanding of your child’s needs.

Graduation

Each year we educate the children about graduating as this helps the children transition into kindergarten. Our Graduation ceremony to celebrate the milestones and educational achievements of each child with them and their families to help give the children a sense of accomplishment and pride.