Many home daycare providers have preschoolers in their care who will be entering formal school next year. We spend many hours teaching our preschoolers important skills that will help them when they begin school.
I decided to write-up an outline of my daycare curriculum so that my daycare parents could get a sense of what we will be working on this year.
I’ve included the outline below to share my parent newsletter with all of you. I mention a Letter of the Week Program in the newsletter. You can find this full year program (includes all activities in detail) on my site through the search bar.
Parent Newsletter -Home Daycare Kindergarten Readiness Program
The program covers four areas of development: Independence, Social, Academic and Fine Motor.
Here are the major points that we will be working on throughout the year. These skills will set your children up for success next September.
Independence:
-Ability to hang up their coat independently
-Take shoes off and place them under coat
-Put coat on independently
-Put shoes on independently
-Dress themselves in their snow suit, boots, hat and mitts
-Be able to recognize and keep track of their own belongings
-Wash hands
-Blow their nose
-Open snack containers
-Open drink container
-Throw their garbage away
*These skills will be worked on during the regular daily schedule. Extra time and specific opportunities will be built into the schedule to allow the children the practice time they need to be successful. Skills will be broken down into manageable steps that build on each other as the year progresses.
Social:
-Ability to share and play in a peer group
-Take turns in conversation
-Feel confident to say their name to a new child and/or adult -Join in with a group of peers playing
-Wait in a line
-Ask for help from a peer and/or adult
-Tidy up toys
-Follow directions
-Share their opinions/thoughts at circle time
-Listen quietly to a story
*Working co-operatively in a group situation is a skill the children practice constantly all day long. I will continue to make time to help each child progress to the next level of their social development.
Our weekly playgroup day will provide us with opportunities to practice these social skills with different peers and in a larger group setting. These playgroup mornings will be a valuable teaching opportunity to prepare the children for the social climate of a Kindergarten class.
Academic:
-Count to ten
-Recognize numbers 1-5
-Recognize some letters that are important to them (i.e. Recognize that D is for Daddy)
-Recognize their name in print
-Know the colour names
-Know some basic shapes
-Show an interest in stories and books
-Enjoy learning about new things
*We will be continuing the Letter of the Week program. This year I will include letter tracing activities and name recognition activities to the program. We will also continue to have a circle time to focus on academic concepts.
Fine Motor Development:
-Be able to cut with scissors
-Be able to use a glue stick
-Use crayons, markers and paint to make shapes and lines
-Trace a line with their finger
-Hold a thick crayon using the proper pencil grip
-Be able to print the first letter in their name
* Craft time will focus more on abstract collages to practice cutting and pasting skills. Time will be spent encouraging the children to draw large loops, diagonal lines, dots and straight lines. The ability to draw these shapes will be used in Kindergarten to form letters.
Field Trips:
We will continue to explore events and activities around town. Even though our focus this year is not on a themed program, I still plan to take the children apple picking and trick-or-treating in the fall, sledding and feeding the deer in the winter, to the flower festival in the spring and strawberry picking in the summer.
We will visit the library to get books that explore the topics and themes the children are personally interested in. This is known as a child lead learning philosophy and it is a very popular approach as the children reach an age when they develop strong personal interests.
I’m looking forward to another year full of learning fun with your children!
Jana
That was my September parent newsletter this year. It gave my daycare parents and idea of what their child would be learning and why. I have noticed that parents appreciate daycare curriculum information in my newsletters, as long as it’s not too detailed (they are busy!).
Feel free to copy and use my curriculum outline for your home daycare! I’m happy to support my fellow daycare providers on their home business journey.
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I’m a former elementary school teacher, and homeschool mother of two, who runs a Waldorf inspired home childcare/preschool. 
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Great information. Your a phenomenal resource.
I did something with letters last year. I incorporated the letter with some senses. The B was printed out and we glued basil on it. C was cinnamon. The kids loved it.
What a fantastic idea! Thanks for sharing it Barbara.
I own a small family daycare and I’m in school for early childhood. I am looking forward to have my own preschool in a future to help kids be ready for kindergarden. I came across to this website and this is exactly what I was looking for. This is great, thank you for sharing this outline. I want to make a part time preschool program and I need at lot of information, this is going to help me a lot. Now that I read this, I know at least how to start, and then go from there. I want to include physical activities, music, art, science, and some Spanish words. Thank you very much!!!