To make available a globally oriented, research based curriculum that is both academically challenging and developmentally oriented to enhance the growing community of families who seek high quality education, while highlighting the importance of sustainability and peace through cultural understanding.
In a novel museum type setting, we build a safe and caring environment that provides the child with materials and structured time directed to free and imaginative play in combination with high quality instruction. The scientific world has compiled a body of knowledge about child development and education. Some methods were field tested years ago and some emerged and were proven to be effective just recently, such as the phonics approach for early reading.
Making a combination of these scientific studies into a comprehensive approach is what makes Imagination Campus different from other educational daycares and preschools. We are truly research based and we have pulled together results from scientific studies over the last decades and from multiple countries, published in several languages and brought them together in an approach that we can now offer to children in the U.S.
A Nation at Risk
Since the prominent report "A Nation at Risk" was first published in 1983, American education has been going through many changes. This report by the National Commission on the Excellence in Education was an eye-opener showing that students in the United States were no longer receiving a superior education and could not compete with students from other developed countries. One of the recommendations was to set up gifted and talented education programs to bridge this gap.
A test taking culture has widely taken roots to compare between students, individual schools and school districts, and with countries with higher test results. Unfortunately many school districts see their funding plummet if their students are not performing well on accountability driven tests. Educational policy makers feel the need to teach to the test and curtail or delete many activities that are tied into imagination from their students time schedule. Curriculum is being narrowed down to highlight elements that can be easily quantified in tests. Often the chance to use those valuable test results to adjust the lesson plans for the benefit of the individual child is overlooked.
Currently more and more educators are interested in the principles of evidence based choices in education and structured, research based sequential multisensory teaching is gaining ground. At Imagination Campus we are speeding up the process of providing research based components in all areas of our curriculum.
Apart from bridging the achievement gap with other developed countries, there is currently a call for another type of change in education in general and in early childhood education in particular: to embrace again a truly developmentally based curriculum. To design a place where the child can be a child again and that offers ample opportunities for imaginative play while enhancing their cognitive and social-emotional growth.
It sounds like a contradiction: to combine the most prestigious academics with the best free play and hands on experiences. At Imagination Campus we believe they can go hand in hand. We are convinced this can happen when the developmental stages of childhood are observed and every child gets the opportunity to shine through the incorporation of the teachings of the Multiple Intelligences Theory.
Not only will this approach lead to happier children, who like school and will be more inclined to become lifelong learners, but this will also most likely lead to stellar achievement. Working towards this goal is the guide line for the choice of components for the Imagination Campus curriculum.
The uniqueness of Imagination Campus is the combination of a caring
atmosphere in a truly novel eco-friendly setting. Heavy emphasis has been placed on the construction of a beautiful and inviting building, tailor made with the child in mind, and combined with a unique research based educational program.
Our exclusive program gives ample time for free imaginative play and incorporates an approach that highlights sustainability and provides the parents with extensive documentation of their childs learning process.
The foundations of the Imagination Campus educational program are predominantly based on the constructivist theory and research in early childhood development and education by Jean Piaget, Maria Montessori, Lev Vygotsky, John Dewey, Howard Gardner, the Reggio Emilia approach, Inquiry Based Instruction technique and structural cooperative learning class room management.
Apart from preferences for certain types of intelligences, children have preferences to work individually, in small groups or in a somewhat larger group. Ideally all key subjects are presented using all different intelligences and possible group settings.
Born and educated in the Netherlands, Dr. Schreuder is a child development researcher and holds both a Ph.D. and MD.
Dr. Schreuder serves on the Board of the Rainard School for the Gifted and Talanted and is extensively involved with the Awty International School. Through her involvement with the Awty International School, Dr. Schreuder has served on the Educational Policy Committee, the School Council, and Strategic Planning Committee. She has published numerous papers and contributed to several books and publications.
Dr. Schreuder reads and speaks French, Italian, Dutch, and English fluently. We are proud to have Dr. Schreuder as the designer of the Imagination Campus curriculum.
2010, Imagination Campus
