Registration

Casey and I are super excited because today we registered Cooper for preschool. I just adore the place we decided to send him for tons of reasons. It seems like a perfect fit for him and in sync with my methodology preferences for early learning (being a teacher makes me a little biased). Here are some of the reasons this place is awesome:

1. It is less than one mile from my school.
2. All instructors are paid a salary, not an hourly wage, and are DPI certified. This is rare for a preschool.
3. The instructors attend continuing ed. classes and even get a prep period to plan during the day.
4. The kids take care of animals there including a......GOAT! Cooper will love that.
5. Each age of kid gets one row in the center garden. They raise their own veggies so they can have fresh, organic snacks everyday.
6. They go outside a minimum of twice a day and the center has hiking trails that lead back into a forest of Oak trees. Beyond the trees lay a beautiful meadow of wild flowers and grasses that the kids get to play in everyday.
7. The center is really keen on new methodologies regarding early literacy and is a very text rich environment that weaves reading/writing into everything they do.
8. They only work with kids ages 2-5 so it is a really focused group of teachers who collaborate on most everything.
9. They do some really cool tactile and sensory activities. The kids play with sensory tables everyday (liquid and solid), make their own Playdoh every week and have targeted small motor and gross motor goals for each week.
10. It feels like a school or even better like Cooper's room...full of fun toys, safe, tons of books, etc. It does not have that typical daycare center feel that we encountered with some other places. When we went for our visit Cooper just darted away from us, running in and out of each room and joining in the different learning activities. He adored it from the start and so do we!!!