Hogg's Hollow

A preschool is a place where young children have fun and prepare to enter transitional kindergarten. So what makes a good preschool? Teachers who are patient enough to handle crises and conflicts, enjoy being with children, recognize the individual needs of each child and are considerate of their interests, and are energetic, make for happy children.

But in this competitive world, promoting emergent literacy and preparing young children for transitional kindergarten is a critical role preschool teachers play and that becomes a strong characteristic of a quality preschool program — appropriate activities that build a solid foundation for reading — awareness that words are made of up of sounds represented by symbols or letters. Teachers help make the explicit link between letters and sounds for children, and students who develop these critical skills are better prepared for learning how to read. At the same tine, children ages three and four develop early reading and language skills when teachers use interactive reading strategies where children talk with the teacher about the pictures and story. This serves as a scaffold to higher levels of reading and comprehension. Teachers help children develop language skills by engaging them before, during and after reading a story: point to the author's name, illustrator's name, story title, make some prediction about what will happened in the story or retell the story to another.

Program description

We have an outdoorsy and culturally hands-on program — preschool children engage in age-appropriate activities throughout the day. Child initiated and teacher directed activities abound for our students who may choose to spend time with other children, with adults, or in solo activities. Some of our activities are the following:

Dramatic play

- role playing, auditory perceptions, diversity in music and songs, movement

Playground

- junior rock wall, sand, water in our fountain "river", monkey bars

Physical exercise

- dance, track, gym, biking, Junior Track & Field Meet

Crafts & arts

- explore with various art mediums, clay, wood, chalk, tempera

Natural Science

- gardening, mechanical (how things work), animals, the weather

Mathematical concepts

- classification, sequence, manipulatives, counting, numerals

Sensory experiments

- cook, arrange, organize, discover

Self image

- language development, social growth, self esteem

Literacy development

- alphabet and letter sounds, journals, begin writing 1st, then last name. With parent consent, students showing early literacy are taught by a personal tutor to read and write

The great outdoors

- Getting out and exploring the world outside of school is at the top of the list, with field trips

Exploring our community

- hike, sheriff station, hospital, fire station & helipad, bank, supermarket, museum, library, parks, bakery, shoe repair, Descanso gardens, plant nursery, city hall, pizzeria, JPL, etc.

Further afield

- Venture out farther than the immediate community with trips to an annual musical theater, Walt Disney concert for children, train ride, beach, cherry picking, pumpkin patch, camping, snow trip, landfill.