Preschool Program

The Preschool Program at Parker River Community Preschool is open year round offering a school year and summer preschool program for children between the ages of 15 months and 6 years old (or prior to Kindergarten entrance). Children may attend preschool for a minimum of two half days per week or a maximum of five extended-days per week.

A typical day at PRCP:

A child’s day at PRCP follows a predictable child-centered schedule that invites self-discovery and incorporates important daily routines. Daily routines such as mealtime(s), bathroom time(s), and rest time(s) are seen as opportunities for growth and learning during a child’s day and are never rushed. Teachers at PRCP also celebrate our community and environment and support children as outstanding citizens through valuing time for tasks such as neighborhood walks, recycling, composting, and more!
Greeting Time
Children arrive, put away their belongings, say goodbye to their families (or parents), sign in, explore the classroom, and assist teacher with the classroom set up and daily chores such as setting out paints, preparing snack, or watering plants.
Meeting
Children and teachers gather together to join for a snack of fresh fruit and our daily meeting time. Each classroom has a turn at least once a week to prepare snack in the studio for the rest of the school. Snack-makers practice reading a recipe, measuring ingredients, pouring, mixing and more.
Project Time
Children work in small groups or alone in the different classroom centers in the indoor and outdoor classrooms; at least 30 minutes of outdoor discovery time is incorporated into project time each day. See our Inspirations page for more information on how the project approach influences our curriculum.
Studio Time

Children have opportunities each day to visit our school wide studio space or explore in the deck studio. Some of the mediums we explore in the studio are as follows: clay, watercolors, easel paints, sculpting wire, collage materials, recycled materials, and pieces of nature. Our atelierista, spends time working on projects with small groups of children each day in the studio. The atelierista or studio teacher may build off of classroom curriculumor plan additional projects to provoke children’s interests or to work on certain skills. When in the studio the children practice how to make a plan, collaborating with a small group, finding the resources needed for a project, take care of materials and more. Playgroups and Discovery Classes are also held in our studio space–see our Playgroups/Classes page for more information and to register. Come visit our new studio space!

Reflections
Children come together to share what they did during their project and studio time, group story or song and independent reading.
Lunch Bunch
Children enrolled in our full day and lunch bunch programs come together for lunch and conversation from 11:30-12:30 each day.
“Young children learn best by playing and following their own curiosities, by solving real problems, such as how to balance a stack of blocks, or how to negotiate a zipper, put together a picture puzzle and most of all, by making mistakes and trying again.”
David Elkind, child psychologist and author