Kindergarten Program
Our full-day Kindergarten program, located at our Lower Junior School campus, is designed to give a child a stronger start in school and in life by providing three, four, and five-year-old students with an engaging inquiry and play-based learning program during the regular school day.
Children are involved in a variety of learning opportunities to help them investigate, problem solve and collaborate, under the guidance of an educator team that includes a teacher and an educational assistant for classes of a certain number of hours.
The focus is on literacy and numeracy. We use the world-famous Jolly Phonics approach to teaching literacy through synthetic phonics. Lessons are not delivered in a traditional lecture style but rather through inquiry and play-based learning inspired by the world-renowned Reggio-Emilia philosophy. Therefore, we view Pre-Kindergarten, Junior Kindergarten, and Senior Kindergarten as a three-year program developing readiness for Grade One.
Children benefit from specialist teachers for Physical Education, Music and French.
Kindergarten Program Special Features
Students will engage and participate in projects and activities within the four frameworks of the Ontario Canadian Kindergarten Curriculum:
• Thinking about belonging and contributing;
• Thinking about self-regulation and well-being;
• Thinking about literacy and mathematics behaviours;
• Thinking about problem solving and innovating.
It is proven that through play-based learning and a culture of inquiry, children develop a strong foundation for learning in all areas. This includes:
- Problem solving and creative thinking;
- Thinking critically about ideas and information in literacy and math;
- Learning to think for themselves, understanding their feelings and those around them, recognizing and respecting differences in others, and assessing the consequences of their actions;
- Understanding their connections, contributions and relationships with others as part of a group, a community, and the natural world;
- Developing socially and emotionally through their relationships with other children and the educators who guide them;
- Developing as a citizen, through a sense of personal connectedness to various communities, like their class, their grade and their school.