KG Curriculum 3-6 Years
Nursery and kindergarten is a preparatory period in elementary education which essential goals are: socialization, development of vocabulary, number and graphic gesture..
At Le Petit Poucet we provide children with opportunities for learning, self-expression, and self-discovery on a variety of areas.
We offer The French National Curriculum with French language as the main language our classes from 0 to 4 years.
Our curriculum is tailored for the below age groups
Curriculum General
Class | Age group | Curriculum |
Babies | under 18 months of age | french program |
Toddlers | 18 months to less than 3 years of age | French program |
Pre-school / petite section / Foundation Stage 1 | 3 -4 years of age | French curriculum |
Foundation Stage 2 / KG1 / Moyenne section | 4-5 years of age | 50/50 bilingual French Curriculum & EYFE (British Curriculum) |
Year 1/ KG1 / grande section | 5-6 years of age | 50/50 bilingual French Curriculum & British Curriculum |
The French Kindergarten Program
Kindergarten is an essential step of the course for the students. The children develop their basic faculties, perfect their language and begin to discover the world of writing, the numbers, and other areas of learning. The principal aim of the Kindergarten is to inspire children to learn and to develop personally, emotionally and socially. The success of this is based on the belief that all children are capable of learning and progressing.
The program is divided into five areas of activity:
- Developing language and discovering writing.
- Becoming a student.
- Physical expression.
- Discovering the world
- Perceiving, feeling, imagining and creating.
PS and MS are part of the early learning cycle.
Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum
The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) is a British curriculum that sets standards for the learning, development and care of children from birth to 5 years old. EYFS supports an integrated approach to early learning and care. It gives all professionals a set of common principles and commitments to deliver quality early education and childcare experiences to all children based on children’s interests. EYFS child will be learning skills, acquiring new knowledge and demonstrating their understanding through 7 areas of learning and development.
Children should mostly develop the 3 prime areas first. These are:
- Communication and language.
- Physical development.
- Personal, social and emotional development.
These prime areas are those most essential for your child’s healthy development and future learning.
As children grow, the prime areas will help them to develop skills in 4 specific areas.
These are:
- Literacy.
- Mathematics.
- Understanding the world.
- Expressive arts and design.
The Program At Le Petit Poucet
- Here at Le Petit Poucet Nursery our whole ethos is learning through play. We believe that all children are individuals who each develop at their own varying rate.
- We ensure that our students are ready to join the school of their parent’s choice, this being a French, IB or British School.
- At Le Petit Poucet we believe that children’s learning results from their interaction with people and their environment are more powerful than lectured learning. Children need a natural flow of affectionate, stimulating talk, to describe what is happening around them, to describe things that they can see, and to think about other people. This is critical for children’s language and cognition, their general capacity to engage with new people and new situations, and their ability to learn new skills. Children’s learning also depends on play and exploration.
- Longitudinal studies show how play enables children to develop flexibility of thought, and to build confidence to explore new possibilities. Our aim by enabling the environment and providing different play based learning opportunities is for children to learn seeing problems from different viewpoints, helping them to develop a generally positive and creative attitude to learning.
- At Le Petit Poucet our teaching methods are based on adult led activities and child initiated activities. We start with enabling the environment so children will play and explore covering the need of engagement. Then teachers will focus on active Learning – motivation. Our aim is to see children being involved and concentrating; to track their ability of continuous trying, and mostly to enjoy achieving what they set out to do.
- By leaving Le Petit Poucet children should acquire the below learning goals each based on his/her learning path.
To achieve this, we are adding few successful teaching methods to the French curriculum:
Each child is unique: A classroom is usually full of students who are about the same age, but it doesn’t mean that they are equally ready to learn a particular concept. So, when designing a lesson we will pay particular attention on children’s interest and build on it to help that child enhance and develop his/her skills.
Positive Relationships: secure relationships between parents and teachers will be a point of focus to ensure that there is continuity of the children’s progress.
Assessments: These will be individualised to each child. They will focus on the strengths and skills a child has achieved, and they will be supported with dated observations or pictures.
Inclusion: Le petit Poucet is an inclusive nursery and Kindergarten. We will encourage and support a wide range of abilities, differing learning styles and competencies across our languages of instruction.
The Bilingual Program in Le Petit Poucet Kindergarten
The bilingual classes in Le Petit Poucet are our signature classes and they start from the age of 4 years to 6 years. Parents can choose between French only classes or 50/50 bilingual classes:
- KG1 / FS2 / MS / 4-5 Years
- KG2 / Year 1 / GS / 5-6 Years
Children can learn two or more languages during childhood without any problems. And that in fact, it is much easier to learn language in the early years. The following are some variables that impact bilingual development that parents should keep in mind:
- Babies learn at their own individual pace. So your child may develop his/her language skills at a different rate than a monolingual child and it may have nothing to do with the fact that she is learning two languages at once.
- A key variable for bilingual acquisition is consistency in how children are exposed to the two languages throughout their early childhood. You can choose to provide a consistency in a variety of ways. For example, one adult should speak one language. Or, your family may speak only French in the home and English outside the home.
- So delight in the joy of hearing your child explore and master two languages. When they’re older, they’ll be able to tell you Thanks…and also Merci!
- Be aware that your child’s vocabulary in each language may be different than that of a monolingual child. Children learning two languages simultaneously may have smaller vocabularies in one or both languages, compared to children learning only one language. Don’t worry about language-mixing. When children start to use both languages in the same sentence, parents may wonder if they are getting confused by the exposure to and use of two languages. Actually, this combined usage is a very normal stage in bilingual language development. Rest assured, over time and with experience, your child will begin to sort the two languages out on her own.