Last Friday 9th November, forty of our CELC children visited Kindergarten for their orientation visit in preparation for their beginning Early Stage One next year and by all accounts, their orientation went very well!
These children have been in the fortunate position to have visited the Kindergarten learning spaces on a regular basis throughout the year (twice a week earlier in the year and now three times a week in term 4.)
Connections formed between St Luke’s Catholic Early Learning Centre (CELC) and Kindergarten (Early Stage One) have supported the continuity of experience for these children who will continue their learning into Early Stage one next year.
The children have familiarised themselves with the learning space environment, they have met and played with children who are currently in Early Stage One (Kindergarten) and are beginning to get to know the Kindergarten teachers and different parts of the school.
From their experiences in both the CELC and in Early Stage one, the children are practising and developing the St Luke’s Pillars of Learning including relating with others, managing self, creative thinking and to communicate and collaborate. This will help to provide a positive transition via a continuity of experience in their learning.
In term four, the children have participated in morning play sessions, Literacy and Numeracy groups in Early Stage One. In their Numeracy visits, the children participated in small group experiences with concrete materials and were guided in their explorations of the concepts of estimation, counting and number. During these visits and in the days that followed, I observed peer modelling and scaffolding between the children in both the Early Stage One and CELC environments. The older children modelled problem solving strategies to the CELC children which included arranging counters in rows of 4 to assist with counting. At the CELC, the children practised their turn taking (manage self and relating with others) as they estimated how many counters they were holding. Practising communication and collaboration skills, the children assisted each other to count the objects, supporting each other’s learning by helping their friends to make sure they used one to one correspondence to count the number of objects. New mathematical concepts were introduced and explored, including counting objects in groups of two.
Critical reflection and discussions between CELC educators on the visits to Early Stage One has provided further extension of learning experiences. This has facilitated further opportunity for the children to practise these skills and to transfer their learning from one context to another.
Continuity of experience, connections and collaboration is supporting a positive transition. I am looking forward to visiting the Early Stage one learning spaces next year where I am sure there will be eager volunteers to introduce their learning space to the new CELC children who will join us in 2019.
Navigating the journey 