About Us
Preschool programming in School District 11 is designed to serve our youngest learners, including children with special needs. We serve 3- and 4-year-old students who reside in the boundaries of Colorado Springs School District 11.
Colorado Department of Education and the Colorado Department of Early Childhood funds our program at NO COST to families through Universal Preschool (UPK). We offer more than 50 preschool programs located in D11 elementary schools. We work with families to determine the best location to fit with their students’ needs.
Our preschools provide high quality instruction to support each child’s developmental needs. We use a comprehensive, integrated curriculum aligned with nationally recognized standards. With an emphasis on active engagement and strong relationships, our preschools introduce children to routine and structure within a school setting. Within our literacy-rich and play-based program, we focus on social and emotional skills, language development, and pre-academic development, while promoting independence and resilience. Children who attend D11 early childhood programs are learning to love school and to have confidence in their abilities.
Our preschool program complies with the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and accommodates children with special needs. If you have concerns about your child’s development, please see the information regarding Child Find.
Students who are 3 or 4 years old by October 1 are encouraged to apply today. We place children in preschool throughout the entire year as space becomes available. Please call 520-2540 for more information.
Vision
As the premier early childhood education provider in the Pike’s Peak region, we are elevating each child’s unique journey toward a bright and promising future. With a deep commitment to children, our programming prioritizes highly trained staff, small class sizes, low student-teacher ratios, and remains grounded in play and social-emotional competence as the foundations for inspiring life-long learners.
Mission
We provide each student with the highest quality preschool experience by emphasizing whole child learning, prioritizing the foundational skills that are the best predictors of future success, supporting each child as an individual worthy of thriving, and by balancing teacher-directed and child-directed learning through play.
Program Commitments:
1. We value and appreciate each child as a unique person, with individual journeys of growth and development.
2. We foster supportive and trusting relationships with each child, knowing these relationships are critical to enhancing learning and achievement, and to inspiring a lifelong love of learning.
3. We carefully curate ambitious learning experiences that reflect the needs and interests of students, and that honor individual differences and cultural and linguistic diversity among children.
4. We encourage active family involvement by cultivating partnerships of cooperation, open communication, and meaningful collaboration.
5. We center students and families in our decision-making.
Program Philosophy
Childhood is a unique and amazing time in the human experience. Rich and nurturing experiences in the first 5 years of life can have a profoundly positive impact on all the years that follow. Progressing through developmental stages is unique to each individual and should be supported by a network of invested adults. Young children learn best when they engage in intrinsically motivated activities, have access to hands-on investigation, are interacting socially, and when they are in a focused and joyful state; this is PLAY. Play is how developing brains become wired for adulthood; it’s how children develop language, motor, cognitive, social-emotional, regulation, problem-solving, resilience, and independence skills. The best early childhood education is enthusiastically rooted in playful learning opportunities.
In acknowledgement of the research regarding child and human development, we must carefully attend to both the content of, and the process of, instruction in our early childhood classrooms. To truly prepare young children for kindergarten (and beyond), our instructional emphasis must rest heavily on the skills that promote ongoing access to learning: attentional and self-regulation skills, social interaction and social competence skills, and fostering a pattern of successful learning experiences to set the tone for students as engaged learners. Preschool standards must be taught in ways that prioritize high engagement, foster internal curiosity, and empower students to learn how to learn.
Every child deserves access to enriching experiences in early childhood. The opportunity to participate in high-quality early childhood programming promotes equity, improves trajectories, and can positively shape outcomes well into adulthood. Children can thrive when they have access to secure social connections with adults, environments that foster curiosity and invite exploration, and scaffolding from adults and peers that help them progress in their development. When a community collaborates to nurture a child, the potential is endless.
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