Our PreK multi-age classes are for children turning 4 and turning 5 during the school year (i.e, must be 3 by October 1 and children stay with the same class for two years.)  Our goal is to ensure that students enter kindergarten as confident, eager learners. The students have choice throughout the day to explore the different centers.  In the late winter we begin to have one or two must do’s so that students begin to practice meeting the expectation of completing work as determined by the teacher.  By the spring this transitions to three or four must do’s. Our primary objectives for the PreK class are:
Social – can follow classroom rules and remind friends to follow as well;  can play games using sportsmanship; can accept consequences of their actions
Group Behavior – can line up and keep hands to themselves; can move between the center activities in a self-directed manner
Manner – appropriate use of Excuse Me;  can clean up work area without reminders
Reading Readiness – give an oral description of a simple process; retell a story with a beginning, middle and end; identify rhyming words; use word family knowledge to phonetically decode words; short vowel sounds; inventive spelling
Mathematical Reasoning – sort on multiple dimensions; duplicate patterns with two alternating properties;   rote count and write 1-10; compare groups of 1-10;  sequentially write numerals 1-10; skip count by 5s and 10s
A note on conflict resolution One of the social developments of our PreK students is their exploration of how words have power.  The classroom conflicts have moved from snatching what is wanted and slapping for attention, to using words for power and meaning.  “You can’t come to my birthday” or “Only Tommy is coming to my house for a playdate.”  We are very attuned to this behavior and recognize that students need be guided on how to appropriately resolve their feelings of jealousy, abandonment, and power.  Throughout the school and from the very first morning, we model and praise appropriate group interactions.  In PreK we also use a series of plays and picture sequences to explore different responses to friends and interpreting how our actions impact others.

SOCDS offers a full day kindergarten.  Kindergarten is not mandatory in New Jersey and therefore we can accept students close to district age cut-offs – either older or younger.  The benefit of this is that children have one more year of growth in a small setting before families made a decision about their entry to an elementary school.  One note is that the health immunization requirements for a kindergarten student are dictated by the class and not by the age of the student. Our kindergarten class has been historically small, approximately 12-14 students per year.  This ensures that students receive individual lessons and activities at their level, while at the same time developing independence among the students. The majority of the learning experience in kindergarten is self-directed.

Students receive a lesson from the teacher and then are given the opportunity to practice and explore the concepts on their own.  The teacher then reconnects with the student to monitor understanding and offer additional direction. The main objectives of our kindergarten program is to:
Social  –  recognize personal property and space;  display sportsmanship and lose with grace;  carry a flowing conversation with peers
Group Behavior –  positively respond to redirection;  invite friends to play and work together
Manners – Interrupt politely and when important;  can acknowledge behavior and actions
Reading – reading chapter books with comprehension; interpret colloquial sayings; identify missing step in a sequence of actions; top 100 sight words; spelling of three and four letter words with short vowels
Mathematical Reasoning – identify and add-on to patterns with multi-criterion; simple computations;  word problems

Daily Schedule for SOCDS

• Drop off outside and Sign In / Health Screening
• Go to classroom and meet teachers
• Morning readiness (enter classroom, hang up jacket, place lunch boxes on shelf, remove folder from backpack and place in folder box, bathroom and wash hands)
• Morning circle
• Center work including a morning snack center every day
• Yoga
• Story
• Outside to play

• Lunch
• Wash up
• Rest period
• Afternoon Circle
• Storytime
• Outside to play
• Dismissal readiness (pack up and get ready to go home)
• Dismissal for full-day students

Summer Camp 2022 – Registration is Open

SOCDS Summer Camp will start on Monday June 27th and run for 9 weeks (closed July 4th.)   Families can choose individual weeks that interest their child.  Tuition is $350 a week.  Our daily day will be 8:30-3:30pm.

Summer Camp 2022 furthers our study of the Environment and Our Impact on the Environment.

Ms. Linda will continue her gardening program for the children two or three times a week.  This is a wonderful opportunity to learn about the garden and make observations about how our plants and flowers are growing.