Choosing Preschool

This article is exactly why state run preschool won't ever work. Which program is the State going to choose? Which one is better for children? The truth is, every good preschool teaches several different programs because the children learn in several different styles. Incorporating several different styles under one roof is essential. Essential also is understanding teachers and allowing teachers to teach. Too often ideologies conflict with a teacher's abilities. A place touts a certain style, but the teachers can't manage it. Sharing teaching helps, so does team teaching.

Preschools Practice Varied Approaches
But feeling comfortable with the staff is a must
BY LINDSAY KASTNER
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
May 2, 2006


Now It's preschool registration season, and your options include everything from parents' co-ops to church schools.

Some preschools are public, some private. Some focus more on academics, others on play.
Suddenly you have to choose between curricula and such educational philosophies as Montessori, A Beka, Waldorf and Reggio Emilia.

And you thought potty training was hard.

Libby Doggett, executive director of Pre-K Now, an organization that advocates for high-quality preschool options, says choosing the right preschool is important.

But take a deep breath.

While preschool curricula and philosophies can differ vastly, Doggett says, parents don't need a degree in early childhood education to choose a good program.

"There's a huge, huge difference . . . based on kind of a different view of children," Doggett says, but she adds, "There's no one way to raise children, and there are lots of good ways to do it."

Learning something about the curriculum a program touts is good, Doggett says, but feeling comfortable with the staff is fundamental.

She says teachers should have a bachelor's degree and some experience in early childhood education.

"Young children are so different from older children," she says. "They really do learn through play."

At the Circle School last week in Oregon Hill, five children played in a public greenway behind the school.

Director Napi Ippolito helped open the vegetarian parents' co-operative more than two decades ago to give parents with unconventional schedules a high-quality child-care option.

The co-op opened with nighttime hours, and the first parents to participate were musicians, restaurant workers and an ambulance driver.

Ippolito still keeps children until midnight many nights. But these days, she's offering the children breakfasts, too.

Because the school is a co-op, parents pitch in whenever they can.

"Some people have nothing but money and we'll take it," Ippolito said. "But most people have much, much more to offer."

Parents help with everything from food preparation to teaching art and music lessons.
"They'll be called upon to do what they can do best," Ippolito said.

The school does not have much of a budget, but it has "work parties" to complete various projects. A future one involves turning an old tree stump into a fanciful outdoor playhouse.

The Circle School was licensed to care for more than 12 children but recently scaled back. It's not looking to add families at this time. But Ippolito encourages other families to consider starting a co-op tailored to the families involved.

The Circle School draws from the philosophies of the Waldorf schools, which limit television in favor of nature walks and imaginative play, and from the Reggio Emilia approach, based on highly regarded schools in that region of Italy.

Some Circle School graduates now bring their children to the school, which has a compost pile out back and a scraggly garden. A mural of a whale -- painted by Virginia Commonwealth University students -- graces one side of the building.

The day is largely unstructured, but the school is active and plugged into the community. Students from VCU fulfill service learning requirements there, and Ippolito frequently walks with her charges to nearby Belle Isle.
. . .
The hallway at Canterbury Community Nursery School was quiet and empty on a recent morning.

Teachers stood sentinel at open classroom doorways.

Canterbury builds into its schedule a period of time every day when children are free to roam from one room to another spending time in areas with different themes. The school calls this "open time."

When a bell rang, dozens of little feet scurried into the hallway, out of one doorway and into another. The place resembled an ant colony. All of the children seemed to have a destination in mind.

Open time isn't an hour-long free-for-all. Each classroom has a colored flag outside its door: white for the library room, green for the art room.

Children enter a room and attach a colored clothespin to their clothes. No more clothespins, no more kids in that room.

And no aimless wandering in the halls.

When a couple of tots started drifting, they got a gentle admonition from another student.
"You have to go to a room and stay there," he told the other boys.

In the science room, one little boy pounded flowers between layers of muslin, while another looked through a view-finder at pictures of bugs. A plastic bin on the table held a collection of bird nests.

The library room was filled with children who all know how to check out their own books, even though most were too young to read. Canterbury's system includes paper library cards that stay in the room and are labeled with each child's photograph. Older children helped the younger ones.

The school's philosophy is based on the theories of Jean Piaget. It is licensed by the state and accredited by the National Association for the Education of Young Children, two facts in which director Terry Tusing takes great pride.

Doggett said the accreditation is the most rigorous that can be sought.

"Nobody is as strong," she said.
. . .
Richmond-area public school systems offer free preschool programs. They include the federally funded Head Start program for low-income 3and 4-year-olds and the Virginia Preschool Initiative for at-risk 4-year-olds not served by Head Start.

The programs differ a little, but both teach similar skills and incorporate lots of parental involvement.

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine has said he plans to expand public pre-k offerings so all of Virginia's 4-year-olds will have access to public preschool.

Libby Doggett of Pre-K Now says that in considering either a public or a private preschool, parents should "absolutely" visit before enrolling a child.

One thing to look for: teachers who follow the children's lead.

"If the children are really, really interested in dogs," Doggett says, "then they'll do a unit on dogs instead of a unit on farm animals."