In simple terms,preschooling is the educational program your child attends even before he/she goes to school. By combining play with learning, preschool education lays a solid foundation for children while preparing them mentally, physically, and psychologically for higher education. While the Indian early childhood education sector has been experiencing rapid growth over the years, the sector still has a long way to go in terms of providing quality and stimulating curriculums for the overall development of our kids. Kids need to be taught in a progressive play way methodology which helps them enhance their intellectual skill sets through independent learning. However, the majority of the preschools in India neither have the proper infrastructure and resources nor have suitable curriculums and methods that focus on the overall development of the kids.

Started in 2018, Vedic Lore Pre-School is a Bengaluru based early learning center for kids in the age group of one to six/ seven with a customized pedagogy focusing on the individual development of children. Ishwarya Iyer, Founder Managing Trustee & Principal of the preschool is an engineer and business administration graduate, who after working many years in the finance sector, pursued her Montessori training at the North American Montessori Center to better her own approach to teaching her own child. She is also trained to implement the Orton Gillingham approach of multi sensory learning through IMSE. As a person who has lived in different places, she explored many of the Bengaluru based pre-schools that run on alternate pedagogy to understand the functioning. The overall experience combined with her ideologies of educating kids in an open and diverse environment pushed her to start Vedic Lore Pre School alongside like minded individuals.

A Unique Educational Philosophy:
Coming to the educational philosophy, Vedic Lore customizes the curriculum that helps it focus on individual development. The curriculum gets personalized based on the individual or specific needs of children. Operating at an 11000 sq ft space in the open environment, the preschool provides more nature-based learning to children. Vedic Lore also has Speech therapists at its campus to ensure that no child is left behind. The school also provides individual time after the regular school timings as well as weekend sessions to children in case of milestone gaps or special needs. In the case of special education needs, Vedic Lore provides early interventions through its partnership with other learning centers that specialize in providing special education to children.

Customized Pedagogy for Individual Development
The pedagogy followed at the school is American based and is in line with the common core standards. A lot of open ended and manipulative based learning is used in

Vedic Lore in terms of teaching methodologies. The Orton Gillingham approach, a certified methodology with a lot of open ended learning and multiple manipulative, is used to teach reading and writing to children through sensory materials. Similarly, Manipulative Math is used to teach math to children through real life examples. As part of book reading, a lot of projects are given to children for early literacy and vocabulary building. During the book readings, stories are picked up and the meanings are explained to children. Later, teachers ask children to associate the stories with their native languages, or through different craft forms.

Being Run with a lot of Conviction
Having its founder run the school as its principal is what makes Vedic Lore stand out from the rest of its peer schools as they run it with a lot of conviction. The teachers of Vedic Lore are highly skilled and experienced. They come from myriad backgrounds and are always open to unlearning and new learning. Even though the teachers at Vedic Lore have an average experience of around 10-18 years, they still believed in the conviction of trying out something different and joined hands with the school. Even the curriculum run at the school is backed up with science and caters to every child. Apart from academics, Vedic Lore also provides different extra curricular activities to children that vary every day throughout the week.

The preschool frequently collaborates with the parents and ensures that they are involved throughout the child’s learning process by sending them updates and progress frequently. According to Iyer, “We have always been very transparent with the parents about all the processes that take place at Vedic Lore. That is why every single admission to our school happens purely through word of mouth without any advertisements or digital media. A lot of our parents even do campus tours for prospective parents”.

The curriculum run at Vedic Lore PreSchool is backed up with science & caters to every child

Vedic Lore believes in vicarious learning to discipline children. Part of the school’s mission statement is to educate children in an empathy-driven environment that is rooted in our values. All the teachers and staff at Vedic Lore behave most mildly with children. In case children have meltdowns, the staff teaches them through role plays and story-based learning. Children in LKG and UKG have a social skills program, where they learn various social skills and natures through role-plays and vocabulary-building activities. There is also a program, where children draw their feelings out and then discuss them on the stage.