10 Questions To Ask On Every Pre-School Tour

Tours can be tricky - you have limited time, you're receiving packets and brochures, walking through new spaces, and learning so much. With all of this going on, some questions may fall through the cracks. Some questions you may not even realize you want answered! For all of these reasons, we've created this list: a useful guide of FAQs to consider before and after you tour our school.

Our teachers are highly qualified early childhood educators. The vast majority of our head teachers have a masters degree in early childhood education from a number of top rated colleges and universities. Ranging from Columbia University: Bank Street, NYU, Brooklyn College, and Hunter College amounts others. In addition, many of our assistant teachers are in the educational program. Our staff undergoes yearly training for CPR/First Aid and Child Abuse as well as background checks. Beansprouts teachers are well supported by our Administration. We encourage our staff to attend yearly teacher trainings and offer tuition reimbursement for those enrolled in an early childhood eduction program. We are also fortunate to have teachers in our classrooms ranging from 25, 21, 18 years as part of the Beansprouts family. Many of our faculty and administration's children have watched their children grow up at Beansprouts; either by attending the nursery school, summer camp or after school programs. In addition, we now have faculty that attended Beansprouts at a young age!

At Beansprouts we believe it's crucial to foster all aspects of a child's development -physical, social-emotional, cognitive and language. We believe the classrooms belong to the children, and our teaches serve at guides. It's a place to share in children's experiences, their interest and their families. Our mission is to help the children learn to problem solve, work together and be a respectful part go our school community and ultimately become good citizens in their expanding worlds. We believe that children learn best by doing, by experimenting and exploring, expressing themselves, belong other and negotiating.

At Beansprouts, we believe that outdoor time is a crucial part of the school day. With a few Exceptions, children play outside every day. Children need fresh air! They need to move, learn about their outdoor environment and plants, and express themselves freely and loudly. At Beansprouts, children have outside time regardless of snow, light rain and cold. Therefore, children must be dressed appropriately with rain gear and snow gear, if needed. Dress your little one with layers, our goal is to head outside daily!

At Beansprouts, we ensure the safety of all children! We have morning and afternoon guidelines for families and caregivers to follow when dropping off or picking up the children. When dropping off, each parent must accompany the child into the classroom and sign their child in for the day. At the end of the day, caregivers and parents must enter the classroom and sign the child out for the day. In addition, for those building with magnetic locks, only parent/caregivers are given the building code for access. A parent must provide the names, phone numbers and address of all people who have permission to pick up their child. A dismissal form must be on file for each child. In addition, if someone other than those people on the child's pick up list is going to pick up a child, parents/ guardians are expected to let the main office know who the person is other wise the child may not be releases until the parent/guardian has notified us of the change.

At Beansprouts in addition to all the fun activities offered during a typical school day, we have a number of specialist that visit the classrooms once a week. A music specialist, a yoga/movement as well as a Spanish specialist visit the classrooms for about 30 minutes each week.

The staff and student ration varies per age and per size of the classroom. Our two year olds have 12 or 13 children with 3 teachers. The 3 year olds will have 15 or 17 students with 2 or 3 teachers while the 4's will have 18-20 with 3 teachers.

We make every effort to provide an environment that is free from tense or problematic situations. Our expectations of our children match the developmental levels of the children to minimize frustrations. Teachers receive ongoing training in areas of positive approaches to discipline and are provided with strategies to use when faced with challenging behaviors. Throughout the day we encourage and help the children figure out what they need and to express this by "using your words". We encourage children to develop their own control, autonomy, management of feelings, problem solving, and find their own rewards in cooperative social behavior. The underlying goal of all discipline at the School is to help children develop self-controls to replace adult-maintained external controls. Whenever a conflict arises we support children in finding their own solutions, while also promoting the development of self-control and empathy within each individual child. Teachers set clear, consistent limits and strive to develop close, nurturing relationships with all children enrolled.

In order to limit the spread of illness in the classrooms, Beansprouts asks that children not be bought to class when they exhibit signs and symptoms of illness. We ask that parents notice school within 24 hours if their child has been diagnosed with a contagious disease, such as strep throat, conjunctivitis and chicken pox.

Our educational director Caryn Klein works closely with our 2's 3's and 4's teacher and through the year. Together, each child's progress is monitored and recorded by using a developmental assessment form created by our Educational Director. We follow the Dept of Educations guidelines therefore at the 4's level follow the NYS Common Core guidelines. Our goal is for the children to be well rounded and well prepared for the their educational future.

Families are an important part of Beansprouts and our classrooms are always open. We like to keep families in the loop by emailing a monthly calendar, weekly as well as monthly updates. We believe in fostering a home and school partnership from day one. The first meeting at the tour and playdate begin the journey to a what we hope would be a strong partnership with families. In September, our families
are invited to attend their class pot luck, where they have the opportunity to meet their teacher , as well as the other parents and children in their class. Our teaches will also schedule a home visit in September in hopes to begin the student teacher bond and ease the phase in process once school starts. Once the children are settled into a routine, we invite families to our Back to School night in September. This a fun time for families to get to know one another as well as learn about the years plans and goals for your little one . In addition to two formal parent teacher conferences a year, our teachers provide their emails and welcome families to contact teachers with any questions or concerns. A day a Beansprouts is full of fun and action, therefore we like to give families a glimpse of a typical day by snapping lots of pictures and posting them on classroom's Shutterfly account.