Curriculum

The curriculum of Bluebird Cottage School reflects the understanding that play is how children learn and develop physically, cognitively, emotionally and socially. Children have ample time to engage in outdoor and indoor self-directed play. In addition, their days are infused with a curriculum that builds literacy, life skills, a healthy body, critical thinking, imagination, and joy. In short, we nurture the whole child.

Building Healthy Bodies

Movement, time outdoors, and self-directed play are essential for healthy brains and bodies. More than half of our morning is spent outdoors, our daily teacher-led gathering time offers the opportunity for developmental movement, and the practical arts of cooking, sewing, and crafting stimulate fine motor muscle development. We pair this with nutritious foods the children help prepare to give growing brains and bodies what they need for optimal development.

Cognitive

Literacy in the Cottage is built through daily exposure to stories, poems, and songs. Usually paired with fine and gross motor movement, children mentally picture the content stimulating the imagination and nurturing the capacity to listen and recite from memory. The ability to mentally picture is the seed for reading comprehension and love of reading later in life. We nurture the seeds of critical thinking and mathematics by providing children with play and craft materials that encourage sequencing, pattern making, and counting. Practical life in the Cottage lends many opportunities to measure, weigh, count and observe outcomes as we cook, garden, and build. We nurture the imagination by providing simple, loose parts play things that lead to open-ended creations and infinite possibilities.

Social and Emotional Well Being

Play is the work of a young child. Play is how they engage with the world, create and destroy, experiment and observe. Play creates the need to negotiate and resolve conflict. Children are offered the time, space and tools to help them with this process. Social and emotional well being are also nourished by a consistent routine, beautiful homelike classroom, purposeful work that builds self-esteem, and loving teachers. In the Cottage, we recognize the child’s need for balance and nourishment of all developmental aspects. Throughout our day we alternate between outdoor, gross motor, expansive play to indoor, fine motor, teacher-led experiences.

Resilience and Self Reliance

We recognize that little things are actually big things in the world of the young child. Daily tasks such as putting on a coat and shoes, pouring water, washing dishes, or cleaning a spill build a child’s self-esteem and sense of belonging and importance. These seemingly mundane tasks also encourage fine and gross motor muscle use and offer sensory rich experiences. We build time and space for self-mastery into our day and encourage children to do as much for themselves as they are capable.