I always believed that education is important for the kids of all ages. My preschool program would be designed for children from birth to eighteen months. I would create a fun environment where little ones would feel safe even if their parents are not around. Though, I would encourage parents to join us once a week and interact with little ones. Little assistance from parents would be very beneficial as Vygotsky describes in his theory. I would also apply Jean Piaget’s stages of development as the background to my preschool program.
Piaget points out that the sensorimotor stage begins from birth through age two. Since this is the period when babies are busy learning new things by looking, touching and sucking, it would be fun for them to be introduced to new shapes, objects and tools of different material. To boost the young child’s social skills, I would place children who are four to eight months in a group and guide them in an exercise where they all played appropriately sized toys.
Guidance is important at this stage as the babies are still little. Therefore, this is where I would apply Vygotsky scaffolding theory. As Piaget states, children from four to eight months are becoming conscious of things around them. Both Vygotsky and Piaget agree that children have capabilities of learning on their own, though assistance from someone with skills is extremely helpful. Furthermore, my preschool program will allow group of young children to play with objects together. This would be excellent for building the knowledge for social support and social interaction. For physical (gross and fine motor skills), I would have an eight to eighteen months old play together with Legos to form an object (any kind of an object). The object would be something simple like a square, or a rectangle. Again, Piaget states that from ages eight months to twelve months, children begin to understand object permanence and can also use objects to reach a goal. Another game I would add to my preschool program would be matching shapes. If the goal was set to build something it would not only help them socialize but it would also teach them to manipulate objects with their fine and gross motor skills to build something. In order to enhance, emotional skills I would create a scenario where children must reproduce an event. I would guide them through the event ” such as knocking over a block or scribbling on a piece of paper ” but would also demonstrate alternative ways of doing such actions. I believe that this would work on the emotional development of children because they are used to seeing things done one way that seeing alternatives may cause very mild distress the child. Another game I would add to my preschool, that was already studied by theorists, is hiding the object and let them figure out where the object is. The child would then be able to develop a sense that things can be done differently and learn to regulate their emotions. Correspondingly, they would learn that only because they cannot see an object does not mean that the object is gone forever. Finally, to enhance intellectual (cognitive skills), I would place different objects around the room and encourage the children to play with them. The objects would be different colors and different material, such as hard, soft, plastic and wood. Piaget theorized that at ages twelve months to eighteen months infants begin to explore new possibilities with objects. By placing objects around the room that the children can manipulate and play with ” it would enhance their intellectual and cognitive skills. They would be able to try to get different results from the objects and learn by trial and error how an object operates or does not operate. This would spark their curiosity, and therefore improve their intellectual. Piaget also theorized that all of the activities that we create as children develop schemas for us later in life. Schemas that we will depend on. All of the activities that I have listed would ideally develop schemas for children that would teach them emotional regulation, proper socialization, curiosity and intellectual, as well as fine and gross motor skills. In addition, Piaget believed in an adaptation process that enables the transition from one stage of development to another. The adaption progress includes assimilation, accommodation, and equilibration. My children would be able to use all three of the adaption processes to move onto other stages of development. For example, accommodation is defined as happening to a child when something they are used to doing does not work the same way it worked before. The knowledge that they used before does not apply to their new object, therefore they will have to change their action to accommodate. My children would learn that skill in the intellectual portion of my preschool class. In my preschool program they would see if they could make it work a certain way or not, and if not, they would be ready for accommodation so that they can try a new way. Unlike Vygotsky who believed that there was social interaction that caused development. I believe that Piaget is correct that development ” such as manipulate of objects to obtain fine or gross motor skills ” must lead towards learning. I also find it fascinating that Piaget theorized that intelligence was not a fixed trait and that cognitive development occurs due to biological maturation and interaction with the environment.All of the activities that I chose for my pre-school program align with Piaget’s idea that intelligence is not fixed. I have designed a program that allows for biological maturation in that the children will attempt different tasks at different ages. In addition, I have created environments where children can interact with objects or other children so that they have exposure to an environment. Overall, my pre-school program fits into Piaget’s theory of childhood development and would be a productive place for children to attend to develop while having fun.