Our Curriculum
Progressive Learning for Children presents curriculum in a variety of ways that recognizes each child’s individual learning style. Play is integrated to support and promote learning in all curriculum areas. It is aligned with the expectations defined by the Rhode Island Early Learning and Development Standards. Below are the 9 domains and a brief description from the RI Department of Education.
Physical Health and Motor Development
The healthy development of young children is directly related to practicing safe and healthy behaviors, strengthening large and small muscles and developing strength and coordination. As their gross and fine motor skills develop, they experience new opportunities to explore and investigate the world around them.
Social and Emotional Development
Social and emotional development encompasses young children’s evolving capacity to form close and positive adult and peer relationships; to actively explore and act on the environment in the process of learning about the world around them and to experience, regulate and express a full range of positive and negative emotions in socially and culturally appropriate ways.
Language Development
This domain involves the development of both receptive and expressive language and a child’s growing understanding of and ability to follow appropriate social and conversational rules.
Literacy
Development in this domain serves as a foundation for reading and writing acquisition. The components within this domain address phonological awareness, alphabet knowledge, print awareness, text comprehension and interest and emergent writing.
Cognitive Development
Development in this domain involves the processes by which young children grow and change in their abilities to pay attention to and think about the world around them. They apply strategies and draw upon past knowledge and experiences to meet goals and solve problems (logic and reasoning); hold information in their mind and manipulate it to perform tasks (memory and working memory); increase their skills in filtering impulses and sustaining attention on a task (attention and inhibitory control) and increase their skills to adjust to changes in demands, priorities and perspectives (cognitive flexibility).
Mathematics
The components within this domain address number sense and quantity; number relationships and operations; classification and patterning; measurement, comparison and ordering; geometry and spatial sense.
Science
From birth children use their senses to observe and gain knowledge about the world around them. As they grow older, they become increasingly more adept at using their observations to make predictions and to plan investigations in order to solve problems and answer questions. The components within this domain address a child’s ability to use scientific methods – observing, planning for investigations, collecting and analyzing data, and communicating information – as well as indicators of a child’s content knowledge of the natural and physical world.
Social Studies
In this domain children gain awareness of how they relate to their family and community, understand social roles and responsibilities, and recognize and respect similarities and differences in people.
Creative Arts
The component within this domain addresses a child’s willingness to experiment with and participate in the creative arts. Music, movement, drama and visual arts stimulate children to use words, manipulate tools and media and solve problems in ways that simultaneously convey meaning and are aesthetically pleasing.