Welcome to the ASD family!
We are excited that you are joining us at the Early Learning Center!
What do we believe in the Early Learning Center at ASD?
The Reggio Principles guide our teaching and children’s learning experiences in the Early Learning Center (ELC)
- The Image of the Child
- The Image of the Family
- The Image of the Educator
- The Environment as the Third Teacher
- Documentation - to make learning visible
- Relationships
We celebrate and respect children as resilient, capable, competent learners who are full of wonder and potential.
We value the diversity of our community and appreciate the unique contributions of each family, culture, and background.
We embrace a Reggio inspired play-based environment, where children have authentic opportunities to work, play, socialize, create and collaborate to make sense of their world.
We believe in the education of the whole child. While daily schedules and routines vary between grade levels, all children in the ELC engage in learning experiences with specialized educators in the disciplines of music, art, physical education, counseling, library, and Arabic.
How do I get my child ready for school?
- Practice independence and celebrate their choices and their hard work to be independent.
- Let them pick out their clothes and dress themselves.
- Let them plan and help prepare a family picnic.
- Help them to independently take care of personal needs, including using the bathroom.
- Zipping, unzipping, putting on and removing socks and shoes seem like simple tasks but these go a long way to help develop competence and confidence.
- Read TO your child. Make books a part of your summer days. Most importantly, let your child see you read- to yourself and to them. Let them hear your silly voices. Let them tell you the best parts and predict how it will end. We tell them all the time they must read, but are we showing them WE read?
- Keep bedtime in the routine. It may be a little later and there will be nights that bedtime doesn’t apply. But overall, if we keep our bodies in a routine with sleep, August won’t hit quite so hard.
- Sit at the table and eat together. Really watch your child. Let them feed themselves and practice cleaning up their space after eating.
- Play without electronics. Play with family or friends encourages oral language, cooperative learning, sharing, and social skills - all required for making and keeping friends!
- Rest. Be ok with not constantly going somewhere. Have fun but allow the time to rest. Boredom gives way to creativity. Rest renews our bodies and our minds for all the next school year has in store.