Nursery
Our Approach
The New York Academy Nursery and Preschool programs offer our young learners a rich and comprehensive curriculum and engaging learning experience. The curriculum focuses on preparing students for elementary school as well as their social and emotional growth. The current student teacher ratio is 8:1.
Focusing on the social and emotional and well as academic needs of our young learners, our pedagogy emphasizes inquiry- and project-based instruction and learning. Through project-based learning, children actively investigate their interests, discover new ideas and develop their own understanding. In keeping with our mission and values, teachers encourage and support each child’s unique style of learning, interests and talents.
During our students’ Nursery and Preschool experience, children learn to manage emotions and regulate their behavior. They learn to control impulses, tolerate frustration, follow behavior guidelines, cope with strong emotions and delay gratification. In our nurturing and supportive environment, teachers gently guide children and help them develop positive social skills. They learn to share, wait their turn, express empathy, show kindness and respect others.
We believe it is important to build a foundation for literacy at an early age. Students learn to understand and use language to communicate their thoughts, ideas, needs and feelings. They develop listening skills and understand increasingly complex language. Students expand their vocabularies as they learn to name and describe characteristics of familiar people, objects and animals. They learn to respond appropriately to statements and questions, and form sentences properly in spoken language. Our teachers also help students speak clearly and pronounce words correctly.
Students in this program will:
- Read a variety of rich children’s picture books from our wide selection of excellent children’s literature.
- Learn to retell stories.
- Develop varied interests and learn to enjoy reading.
- Learn to tell simple stories about objects, events and imaginary characters. As children develop this skill, they include a logical order of events and major details in their stories.
- Learn to engage in back-and-forth exchanges and learn the social rules of communicating, such as being polite, speaking clearly and taking turns.
- Learn letter sounds and the names of the letters. If they are developmentally ready, they learn to write letters too.
We know how important experiencing mathematics is for brain development. During the Nursery and Preschool years, students develop the foundations of basic mathematical knowledge and skills.
Students in this program will:
- Learn number concepts and spatial relationships.
- Develop an understanding of comparisons, measurement and patterns.
- Learn to count and identify beginning numbers and connect them with their quantities (1:1 correspondence).
- Learn directions related to proximity and use and respond to positional words indicating location, direction and distance.
- Learn basic shapes and describe two-and-three-dimensional shapes.
- Compare and order sets of objects according to size, length, weight, area and volume.
- Learn about measurement by using multiples of the same unit to compare differences.
- Copy, recognize and describe patterns.
- Use simple strategies to solve mathematical problems.
Students learn about the characteristics of animals and plants, and the basic physical properties of objects and materials. They also learn about our environment and how to care for it. Our students learn to notice, think and realize.
Students learn about themselves in terms of age, gender and physical traits. They also learn about other people, their characteristics and how they live. They learn about different types of families, and the different roles people play in families, school and the larger community in which they live.
New York Academy encourages our young students to express themselves creatively through visual art, dramatic play, dance and movement. Students participate in performances and plays. Visual arts activities include painting, drawing, making collages, modeling, sculpting, building and weaving. Visual arts activities improve children’s self-esteem and original thinking skills. Movement and dance facilitates expression of emotions and develops physical awareness and capabilities. Students develop language and literacy skills, self-awareness, emotional understanding, and problem-solving skills through participation in dramatic play and performances.
New York Academy guides our young students to learn to appreciate different kinds of music and enjoy different forms of musical expressions. Students listen to music, learn to sing a variety of songs and begin to move to music. Students learn to use musical instruments such as the shaker, tambourine, rhythm stick and drum.
Students develop an appreciation for modern languages through activities that grow their phonological awareness, speaking, and writing skills. They learn basic sounds and words as well as correct pronunciation and intonation.
New York Academy employs a knowledge-based and fundamental skill-set approach to physical and health education. We guide our young students to develop gross-motor and fine-motor skills. They learn balance, coordination and traveling skills, such as running, hopping, climbing and jumping. We also provide ample time for children to play freely in our Imagination Playground. During outdoor playtime, they get physical exercise and develop their imaginary and social skills as they play together. The children are introduced to concepts and practices of healthy eating and living.