Parents in the South-western part of Singapore who wish to put their children through a Chinese focused early years education programme can look forward to a new ELFA Chinese Preschool in Pandan Valley from June 2018.
ELFA is one of four successful early childhood brands under the wings of the Crestar Education Group. The new centre is located in Block 3 of the Pandan Valley Condominium, off Holland Road, offering pleasant outdoor space for play, including a spice garden, fruit trees, amidst the lush greenery and tranquility of the estate.
The centre has spacious classrooms, an art studio and indoor activity area for children from 18 months to six years of age.
Its curriculum is specially designed to help its children to love and build a strong foundation in Chinese, an essential language for the new Asia-centric environment. At this ELFA centre, Chinese becomes a living language. Children learn Chinese through fascinating story-telling from our unique Story-Based curriculum, which has been jointly developed and localised by our panel of advisors and curriculum developers from China and Singapore.
The Chinese curriculum includes a rich moral and social values content, which helps children learn and develop desirable habits, good conduct and social responsibility.
ELFA has also developed a set of advanced Chinese Mathematics Curriculum to support children’s logical thinking and help them to understand and use Mathematics in their everyday life. It emphasises a developmental, sequential and structured approach based on the current international best practice and teaching methods. The Maths curriculum content is developed and linked to Singapore primary one Maths syllabus.
Children are taught to appreciate Chinese culture and arts, includng various festivals, which help to enrich their learning and strengthen their character, conduct and social values. Weekly Chinese Speech and Drama lessons are conducted to immerse children in a culturally-rich Chinese learning environment.
Our Pre-Nursery and Nursery children enjoy 100 % immersion in Chinese language and culture while those at K1 and K2 at 50% as they would have already build the basic foundation by then.
Children at K2 will also have the opportunity to sit for the Youth Chinese Test, a version of the internationally recognised Chinese Proficiency Test (HSK).
Lessons are carried out in small groups. Extra-curricular learning include the ELFA Creative Art programme that is conducted in a dedicated art studio. Children are taught by Art specialists using methods based on research and observations on how children learn from the activities they are engaged in. This programme has been integrated to balance the children’s academic learning with creative skills such as music, movement and visual art.