Library and Music

Library

The Mandell School Early Childhood Library is a learning environment designed to foster literacy and a lifelong love of books. We strive to teach children the importance of borrowing and returning and borrowing again. The Preschool Division has weekly small group library periods outside of their classrooms beginning in the Threes program.

A typical period in the library always starts with a story time followed by a time for questions, comments, and related activities. Story time is a culmination of classic, modern, and curriculum related literature in various mediums including traditional books, felt board stories, songbooks, and oral storytelling.

The second half of the period is dedicated to the process of selecting then checking out library books. Preselected books are placed in browsing bins which allows the students to feel independent and confident in their book choices. Then one by one, the students hand their books to the librarian and get to see and hear the scanner register their books within our library system. The period then ends with a few minutes of quiet reading time before they are dismissed.

Children in the Twos program participate in story times within their classrooms, but may visit the library for special story times during the Spring.

Music

The Preschool music curriculum at Mandell is designed to develop musical, social, cognitive, physical, and emotional skills that will serve as a foundation for each child’s musical experiences to come. The curriculum supports and builds a child’s individual understanding of basic music fundamentals. At Mandell, we guide children to become personally confident and competent in their musical exploration. The curriculum is designed to prepare children to become musical in three ways:

  • Tuneful – to learn songs or “tunes” and to coordinate their voices to sing those melodies
  • Beatful – to feel the steady pulse of music, and to demonstrate in different ways the grouping of the beats (in twos or threes)
  • Artful – to be moved by music and the emotions it evokes