Introducing The Creative Curriculum for Pre-K

For more than 45 years, Teaching Strategies has been committed to creating early childhood curriculum materials, resources, and guidance that honor, uplift, and celebrate young children and the adults who educate them. We invest more than any other early childhood company in listening to and learning from educators in the field and transforming those ideas into meaningful enhancements and new innovative offerings.

We are thrilled to announce the launch of one such new product designed specifically to meet the unique needs of teaching and learning in the critical year before kindergarten: The Creative Curriculum for Pre-K.

Our new, comprehensive pre-K curriculum

• leverages a whole-child approach;
• harnesses the power of play through hands-on, project-based studies;
• offers explicit instruction supported by the science of reading to build early literacy skills;
• provides families with seamless connections to what their children are learning at school; and
• includes planning and teaching tools that simplify everyday tasks to help teachers focus on what matters most—responding to the children who are right there in front of them!

Five Reasons to Love Our Pre-K Curriculum

1. Honors the Whole Child in Their Journey to Kindergarten 
At the heart of our curriculum are 38 objectives for development and learning. The objectives are based on current research and best practices and cover the areas of development most closely linked to success in school and beyond (social–emotional, physical, language, and cognitive) as well as the content areas of literacy, mathematics, science and technology, social studies, the arts, and English language acquisition. Teachers are given the support they need to individualize instruction for every child using our detailed progressions of development and learning from birth through age 8, the only such developmental progressions available in an early learning curriculum.

2. Harnesses the Power of Play Through Studies  
The curriculum is organized into long-term, project-based studies of interesting topics that put children at the center of their own learning. They will explore and investigate everyday materials related to percussion instruments, seeds, grocery stores, light, cameras, and architecture. They will measure, categorize, chart and graph, collect data, test, hypothesize, and do so much more. They will learn how to ask big questions and explore big ideas, as they develop a thirst for discovery, a love for learning, and critical thinking skills.

To ensure that teachers, children, and their families enjoy a great start, The Creative Curriculum for Pre-K includes a unique Teaching Guide with specific guidance for making the most of the first six weeks of school. Available only through The Creative Curriculum for Pre-K, this Teaching Guide supports teachers in establishing meaningful rules and routines, building children’s confidence, and forming a collaborative classroom community so that children feel welcomed, valued, safe, capable, and loved.

3. Provides Focused Daily Experiences for Literacy and Mathematics 
Skill development is a sequential and scaffolded ladder of learning in which skills build on each other over time. Because research confirms that children learn best through play, The Creative Curriculum for Pre-K includes play-based experiences focused on phonological awareness, shared writing, and mathematical concepts, including activities for reinforcing skills when teachers only have a few minutes to fill during transitions.

To help children build essential pre-reading skills, the curriculum provides daily, explicit, and focused instruction backed by the science of reading. The Creative Curriculum for Pre-K

• promotes functional literacy through project-based studies that give children authentic reasons to read and write;
• develops children’s phonological and phonemic awareness through developmentally appropriate engagement;
• individualizes learning for each child through intentional, small-group language and literacy experiences; and
• provides meaningful read-alouds and book discussions that nurture a love of reading.

4. Connects School to Home 
Becoming part of a classroom community is a big step for children. When families are invested, included, and connected to what their children are learning, children will flourish. Here are a few ways that The Creative Curriculum for Pre-K nurtures this seamless connection.

• Modeled Moments of literacy, bilingual eBooks, songs, playlists of videos, and activities directly tied to the daily classroom instruction are automatically sent to families’ digital devices to help them support their children’s learning at home.
• The Family Mobile App allows families to communicate with teachers, view resources, and find videos modeling activities to do with their children at home if they want to focus on developing a specific skill.

5. Makes Teachers’ Lives Easier With Smart Planning and Teaching Tools 
The Creative Curriculum for Pre-K includes digital tools that save teachers time by streamlining planning and teaching. These tools connect curriculum, assessment, family engagement, and professional development and provide reporting tools – all right at a teacher’s fingertips.

The Creative Curriculum for Pre-K leverages technology in ways that free up a teacher’s time, empowering them to focus on the important work they do with children that no technology could ever replace. Some of these time-saving features include

• planning for a week, month, or even an entire year, in mere minutes;
• instantly viewing and customizing daily resources and guidance to facilitate teaching, individualize instruction, and adjust on the fly, as needed;
• automatically becoming a part of a powerful, built-in online professional learning community; and
• easily accessing a newly enhanced, multi-function teacher app that allows teachers to pull up daily resources as they are teaching, document children’s progress, and communicate with families easily.

Start your 2024 school year off right with Teaching Strategies and The Creative Curriculum — the choice of 4 out of 5 of the largest school districts, 90% of Head Start programs, and many leading childcare providers.