The curriculum for the younger preschool group is adapted from a selection of Bulgarian preschool teaching materials. An important objective of the curriculum is activities to coincide with the social and cultural context in which children live, so they are easier to understand by the children and their families. Classes are conducted exclusively in Bulgarian and are based on life in the US and their knowledge of English, so they can easily find connections between the two languages. We will focus on enriching the vocabulary and developing a better understanding of the Bulgarian language and culture through storytelling, discussions, songs, poems, and games. Homework assignments will be for children and parents, such as a short song or poem to read or learn, telling a short story, or painting a picture. Especially helpful in this group is the interaction with other children allowing for faster learning and vocabulary building.

Teacher: Yana Ganeva

The purpose of the education in “Strawberry” group is the parallel development of children’s Bulgarian language abilities in accordance with the knowledge gained in the elementary school. The active vocabulary enrichment in oral and written communications is achieved by:

• Creating and maintaining interest in reading and writing
• Improvement of the reading technique - short texts reading
• Building of basic skills in written communication by using language problems with entertaining nature in order to stimulate interest in reading and writing
• Finding missing letters in a word, reading the completed word and making a connection between the word and pictures of the object or action that the word signifies
• Reading texts with new vocabulary and guessing the unknown words’ meaning
• Playing games with words: which letter is missing, how many words you can read, change the order of the letters in a word to create new words, etc.
• Solving puzzles where the words are guessed with the help of numbers, pictures, letters, etc.

Teachers: Svetlana Karayotova

The “Blueberries” Multilingual Bulgarian School group focuses on teaching/learning basic Bulgarian language skills by introducing students with multiple language households to Bulgarian language rich learning atmosphere.
Since Bulgarian is NOT the primary language spoken at home for all “Blueberry” group students, lessons and activities in this group are geared towards helping students understand and connect to the Bulgarian language basics. Lessons, activities and discussions are differentiated and delivered based on the student's individual Bulgarian skill set, translated into English if needed in order for students to fully understand and connect to the meaning of Bulgarian language. The goal of the “Blueberry” group is to start seeing and recognizing language patterns that link English to Bulgarian in a meaningful way, in order to allow students’ brains to make Bulgarian language learning connections in their everyday life experiences. This is achieved by:

• Learning of Bulgarian Alphabet and sounds
• Learning of vocabulary words in variety language categories
• Reading/comprehension of Bulgarian Folk Tales
• Reader’s Theater reading/comprehension strategy
• Basic blending of Bulgarian sounds and creation of words
• Basic writing of Bulgarian words and creating of sentences
• Using Буквар to teach writing and reading skills
• Playing of Bulgarian language rich games
• Hand on crafts and arts activities focused on Bulgarian language and culture understanding
• Conversations and discussions held in Bulgarian, translated into English if needed
• Singing of Bulgarian children’s songs
• Relationship and community building activities

Teacher: Anna Mogensen

The main goal for the group “Apples” is to gain knowledge of the grammar and the everyday usage of the Bulgarian language. The classwork is designed to improve the oral and written communication abilities of the students through listening, speaking, reading and writing. The reading lessons aim to improve the comprehension of variety of texts and the ability to identify the topic, the keywords, the main idea, the time and place setting and the characters. The students will learn to ask and answer questions about the text in order to be able to retell it orally and in writing.
The students will also learn to recognize and write with correct punctuation four basic types of sentences - declarative, interrogative, imperative and exclamatory. Knowledge of the Bulgarian language is built through work on various text types - poems, stories, fairy tales, fables, proverbs, sayings and riddles.

Class topics:

• Printed and handwritten alphabet.
• Vowels and consonants in Bulgarian language. Syllables, words and sentences. Spelling and pronunciation.
• Use of capital letters, commas, hyphens, and punctuation at the end of the sentence.
• Nouns, adjectives and verbs. Gender and number of nouns and adjectives.
• Definite article for nouns and adjectives.
• Past, present and future tense of the verbs. Comparatives and superlatives.
• Writing a letter and a greeting card.

The main goal for the group “Oranges” is to enrich students’ vocabulary and develop sense of use of the words by studying Bulgarian language art through poems and stories for children.
Learning about the richness of the Bulgarian language - synonyms, antonyms, words with direct and indirect meaning, epithets, metaphors and others.
An important part of the lessons is to acquaint the students with the rules for the use of language in conversations and monologues, in description and narration.

Class topics:

• Rhyming.
• Consolidation of grammatical rules of written text.
• Dictation. Spelling of words.
• Correction of words and text.
• Reading and understanding of long text.
• Reading a dialogue with role-play.
• Detailed retelling of a text.
• Writing an essay and stories from observations and own experience. Fiction.

Teacher: Mariya Radeva

The classes in history and social studies, carried in two age groups, make use of the Bulgarian study programs and textbooks. We concentrate on the introducing the children to the basic geographical and historical facts and personalities. Our goal is to provoke their curiosity so that they will continue to be interested in Bulgaria.
Our students grow in a multi-cultural environment, they are citizens of the world, so we constantly emphasize the links between the Bulgarian and world history and culture. We instill pride that they are Bulgarians but also awareness of unity with all people around the world.

Teacher: Avrora Moussorlieva