Parent Involvement

As parents are always their children’s first and lifelong teachers, we focus on multiple pathways of communication and opportunities for parent involvement in your child’s preschool experience. It is our goal to partner with you so that we can best support your child’s learning.

Transitioning into Preschool

Starting a new preschool program can be a major adjustment for any child. A transition plan helps children ease into a new environment and routine. It is important that children feel comfortable at their new school before they are present without their parent/guardian or caregiver. To address the normal separation anxiety that children feel when parents are away, we start by inviting a parent to attend with their child for the first couple of days of preschool. Each child’s transition is unique and may require less or more time with a parent/guardian or caregiver present. The teachers will help you with this transition and assist in the process.

Parent Communication

Frequently connecting with you about your child is very important to us. When your child is in our care, it is helpful to know about his or her home life to provide us context for our teacher conversations, or to be aware if they are tired, or may need additional emotional support.Throughout the year there will be many informal and formal communication opportunities such as: greeting and departure times each day, parent gatherings such as workshops, coffee hours, parent volunteer opportunities, email communications, parent conferences, and informal meetings by phone or in-person.

Integral to our approach are child observations and record keeping which aid in identifying individual strengths, developmental milestones, social engagements, learning styles, and areas that may require additional support or assessment. These observations are also communicated to parents through updates and parent-teacher conferences. We implement a couple of parent Ages and Stages questionnaires twice a year to screen for any developmental areas that might need additional support or assessment. Parent-Teacher conferences occur twice each year. The Fall Semester conference will focus primarily on social-emotional development whereas the Spring Semester conference additionally includes information about your child’s motor skills, cognitive development, language development and emerging math and pre-literacy skills.

Coffee Hours and Parent Education

Parents are invited a couple times each month to attend parent coffee-hours where we gather as a community to discuss a variety of child development topics and whatever is on your parenting mind. These events have been a favorite and supportive time for many parents enrolled in our program over the years. Occasionally we also invite a speaker/parenting coach/or other expert to present a topic of interest in a late afternoon or evening event.

Field Trips and More

Parent involvement throughout a child’s school experience is a strong predictor of academic achievement long-term. We want to partner with you to help your child thrive. There are two family field trips per year as well as opportunities to volunteer with fundraising events, campus beautification, or gardening.

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