Our Children’s Courses — See at a glance what your child will learn
The Women’s Centre uses an identification system that shows the areas of early childhood development targeted by our children’s courses. The system is based on the Quebec government’s guidelines for early childhood educators and day cares.
The four dimensions of early childhood development are: cognitive, language, motor, and social-emotional.
The cognitive dimension covers your child’s abilities to absorb, process and apply knowledge in different ways. Imitation, problem solving, deducing, predicting, sequencing, etc., are some of the abilities included in the cognitive dimension.
The language dimension focuses on the process of developing words and speech through reading, music, and interaction. From singing songs, to travelling in stories, to moving to the beat, language is the threshold to building an understanding of the world around us.
Motor ability focuses on building a connection between mind and body. Crawling to get a ball, climbing a ladder, cutting on a dotted line are just some of the activities that help build strength, balance, hand-eye coordination, and confidence.
The social and emotional dimension covers the complex world of parallel play, sharing, waiting your turn, making friends and cooperating. Much of this learning happens in everyday life, but can also be fostered through activities that are mindful of your child’s stage of development and readiness.
While all of our children’s courses include experiences in all four dimensions of development, each course targets one or more specific skills. When you read the descriptions of our children’s courses, look for the colour circles that indicate the skills targeted.
WIWC Children’s Courses: Encouraging Your Child’s Development