Preschool Lessons - Developing an Age Appropriate Curriculum

Students will lose interest in preschool lessons ifwrite the alphabet, learning to tie their shoes, or
they are not direct and focused. Lessons shouldmemorizing their home address. These individual
have a clear purpose, and teachers should remindactivities challenge students but will not interfere
students of the lesson multiple times. Just as inwith a teacher's lesson for the class at large.
speechmaking, teachers should tell students whatTeach Right and Wrong
they are going to learn, teach them, and then tellPreschool Lessons are a great place for teachers
them what they learned.to bring in the ideas of right and wrong. Because
By repeating preschool lessons multiple timesstudents will probably be reprimanded for
throughout the day or over a series of days, theinappropriate behavior or speech, teachers should
material sinks in better for students andstrive to impart these lessons explicitly for
encourages retention. By forcing the lesson to bestudents. By including components of social values,
repeated, it also helps the teacher focus on thecustoms, and appropriate behavior, teachers help
most important aspects of the lesson.students grow into fully-functioning members of
Age Appropriatesociety.
There are some lessons that are simply tooIncluding lessons of right and wrong is not hard
advanced for preschoolers because of thefor an everyday lesson. If teachers are telling
abstract quality of the material being presented orstudents about nature, they can include a
the detailed data required for understanding.sentence or two about the importance of keeping
Teachers should always take into account thenature clean and preserving our resources. While
maturity of their students and their cognitivetalking about holidays, teachers can show
development.customary greetings for that holiday and how to
However, this does not mean that teachersrespond when someone says something to you.
should hold back on educating preschoolers.Preschool lessons must be specifically tailored to
Teachers should always push their studentsthe needs of young students. Teachers should
forward, encouraging them to learn and growmake lessons interesting, focused on a specific
through preschool lessons and other activities. If atopic, and repetitive. By repeating the point of the
teacher feels that the class is beyond preschoollesson, teachers give students more chances to
lessons, they should introduce more advancedabsorb and truly understand the material
concepts, similar to those taught in kindergarten.presented.
If a teacher is dealing with one or two studentsPreschool lessons should also challenge students at
who are clearly more advanced than the group,their own level. Advanced students can have
the teacher should consider additional activities forindividual projects to work on to help keep them
those students. Such activities should be individual,interested, and teachers can include lessons of
so the students can still participate with the classright and wrong to help all students understand
but be challenged on their own level.proper social behavior.
Tasks for such students could include learning to