COW HOLLOW SCHOOL |
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Curriculum The curriculum at Cow Hollow School is based on play, inquiry, exploration, developing relationships, and love of learning according to the natural patterns of the individual child within the context of group learning experiences. The structure of activities, resources and interactions within the classroom are organized to provide children with safe, comfortable and familiar routines, while at the same time, challenging them to reach their potential as learners, producers, listeners, stewards and creators. Children are natural learners. They are inherently inquisitive and learn about the world by exploring their environment, in play and during interactions with peers and adults. For this reason, at CHS the children are given significant amounts of time each day to play, investigate and explore. Teachers and parents actively observe and document the children’s learning and play processes throughout the entire day. Teachers support the children’s play by building nurturing relationships with each child, encouraging empathy and compassion, encouraging them to express themselves, and learn ways to enter into play, conversations and comfortable conflict resolution. CHS’s learning and play environment exposes children to the necessary tools that inspire, provoke and foster inquiry and critical thinking. With support from the teachers and parents, the children can explore and make discoveries at their own pace and according to individual interests. Carefully planned stations encourage reasoning, inspire and provoke theories, and help children recognize patterns and relationships that they may have intuitively observed. As natural born scientists and explorers, children are drawn to the outdoor environment for the rich, authentic and sensorial opportunities, and endless potential for inquiry and discovery. At CHS, the teachers guide children as they “learn to see” the beauty and drama of the natural world so that they my gain an appreciation for, and develop a relationship with, nature beyond the houseplant and sandbox. While in collaboration with teachers and parents, children develop limits and boundaries for staying safe, but there is no limit to what the imagination can do out there, or how the senses are stimulated. Through observations, projects are lunched, theories are made, and relationships are strengthened between nature, adults and the children. Teachers record the children’s actions, questions and comments, and may ask children to represent through art, building or movement what they have experienced. Gathering, organizing and presenting the data from an experience provides opportunities for the children to revisit the experience, helps them appreciate the process of investigation in nature, and helps them understand the meaning of their experience, and build memories and knowledge. |