Early Childhood

The Reggio Emilia-inspired approach at Community Day provides children the tools to navigate their own unique paths of discovery. Our project-based curriculum encourages children to be active participants in the learning process and to develop the skills needed to explore their ideas, interests, and questions in a meaningful way.

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Research overwhelming supports play-based learning

Play-based learning embraces giving children time to carry out their own ideas through play. Children are allowed to explore information in their surroundings in an experiential, exploratory way, rather than in a didactic, script-based format. Link here for research commissioned by the United States Department of Education documenting the signifigant benefits of play-based learning outcomes. 

Community Day's Early Childhood program incorporates the HighScope Preschool Curriculum which is based on more than 50 years of research on early childhood development. 

In the HighScope Preschool Curriculum, learning is focused on the following eight content areas:

• Approaches to Learning
• Social and Emotional Development
• Physical Development and Health
• Language, Literacy, and Communication
• Mathematics
• Creative Arts
• Science and Technology
• Social Studies

Preschool Curriculum Content

Learning in these areas is guided by 58 key developmental indicators for Early Childhood learning and 42 key development indicators for Infants and Toddlers  (KDIs). Each KDI identifies an important learning goal for young children. We recognize that the normal pace of children’s development and learning varies widely across these eight categories and the KDIs reflect that continuum of widely held expectations. Our curriculum is designed to help teachers appropriately scaffold learning for every child across all areas.

The HighScope key developmental indicators

• Provide teachers with a child development “filter” for observing and choosing appropriate interactions and activities
• Help teachers interpret what young children say and do along a developmental continuum
• Enable teachers to maintain reasonable expectations for young children
• Reinforce children’s play as the primary mechanism for learning
• Allow teachers to be more knowledgeable and intentional in their daily planning for individual children and the class

The classroom model

Active learning is at the center of the HighScope Curriculum. It’s the foundation of young children gaining knowledge through their natural play and interactions with the environment, events, and other people.