Frequently Asked Questions

Yes!  Colusa Kinder's standard 8am-2:30pm program offers enrollment options for 2, 3, or 4 days a week (as well as 5 days per week) and hourly drop in to extend as needed.

We also offer extended care (7am-6pm) Monday through Friday if needed (and available).

Please simply complete this very brief survey which immediately places you in queue, and we will reach out to you within a few days: https://forms.gle/ogVLxTgRSQ9zXzcg6

First, we see our role as care providers / teachers to primarily listen (and respond very intentionally, focusing on language learning, literacy development and social / emotional learning). While English is the primary language in our program, we may sometimes sprinkle in French, Spanish, PLUS many books, stories, music, and phrases if our families wish for us to use as a bridge between home life and Colusa Kinder. For example, I have learned a bit of Mandarin, Ukrainian, and Japanese as a means to warmly welcome a new child to our community if that is the first language spoken in the home. Exposure to multiple languages early in life supports cognitive/social and emotional development. Our holistic, play based, Reggio inspired curriculum is focused on developing the whole child with love, warmth, and joy. Throughout our intentional, meaningful activities, we simply facilitate pathways for our children to become confident, creative, expressive, and compassionate citizens of the world - through enjoyment of language, music and lots and lots of books!

Tuition and childcare cost is $1400 per month for Colusa Kinder's standard program which is 8:00am-2:30pm Monday through Friday, with hourly (higher) drop in rates when available.  

Extended, full-time care (7:00am - 6:00pm) is between $2100-$2400, depending on age of child.  All care options include nutritious, organic breakfast and afternoon snacks.

We embrace the Reggio Emilia model as our philosophy.

The following overview of the Reggio Emilia Approach was taken from a packet of information available at The Hundred Languages of Children traveling exhibit:

The Reggio Emilia approach to early care and education is committed to the creation of conditions for learning that will enhance and facilitate children’s construction of “his or her own powers of thinking through the synthesis of all the expressive, communicative and cognitive languages” (Edwards and Forman, 1993).   The Reggio Emilia approach is based upon the following principles:

Emergent Curriculum: An emergent curriculum is one that builds upon the interests of children. Topics for study are captured from the talk of children, through community or family events, as well as the known interests of children (puddles, shadow, dinosaurs, etc.). Team planning is an essential component of the emergent curriculum. Teachers work together to formulate hypotheses about the possible directions of a project, the materials needed, and possible parent and/or community support and involvement.

Project Work: Projects, also emergent, are in-depth studies of concepts, ideas, and interests, which arise within the group. Considered as an adventure, projects may last one week or could continue throughout the school year. Throughout a project, teachers help children make decisions about the direction of study, the ways in which the group will research the topic, the representational medium that will demonstrate and showcase the topic and the selection of materials needed to represent the work. Long-term projects or progettazione, enhance lifelong learning.

Representational Development: Consistent with Howard Gardner’s notion of schooling for multiple intelligences, the Reggio Emilia approach calls for the integration of the graphic arts as tools for cognitive, linguistic, and social development. Presentation of concepts and hypotheses in multiple forms of representation — print, art, construction, drama, music, puppetry, and shadow play — are viewed as essential to children’s understanding of experience. Children have 100 languages, multiple symbolic languages.

Collaboration: Collaborative group work, both large and small, is considered valuable and necessary to advance cognitive development. Children are encouraged to dialogue, critique, compare, negotiate, hypothesize, and problem solve through group work. Within the Reggio Emilia approach multiple perspectives promote both a sense of group membership and the uniqueness of self. There high emphasis on the collaboration among home-school-community to support the learning of the child.

Teachers as Researchers: Working as co-teachers, the role of the parent/teacher is first and foremost to be that of a learner alongside the children. The teacher is a teacher-researcher, a resource and guide as she/he lends expertise to children (Edwards, 1993). Within such a teacher-researcher role, educators carefully listen, observe, and document children’s work and the growth of community in their classroom and are to provoke, co-construct, and stimulate thinking, and children’s collaboration with peers. Teachers are committed to reflection about their own teaching and learning.

Documentation: Similar to the portfolio approach, documentation of children’s work in progress is viewed as an important tool in the learning process for children, teachers, and parents. Pictures of children engaged in experiences, their words as they discuss what they are doing, feeling and thinking, and the children’s interpretation of experience through the visual media are displayed as a graphic presentation of the dynamics of learning. Documentation is used as assessment and advocacy.

Environment: Within the Reggio Emilia schools, great attention is given to the look and feel of the classroom. Environment is considered the “third teacher.” Teachers carefully organize space for small and large group projects and small intimate spaces for one, two or three children. Documentation of children’s work, plants, and collections that children have made from former outings are displayed both at the children’s and adult eye level. Common space available to all children in the school includes dramatic play areas and worktables for children from different classrooms to come together.

Teacher Role, as children grow and learn:

• to co-explore the learning experience with the children
• to provoke ideas, problem solving, and be comfortable with cognitive dissonance
• to encourage ideas from the children and return them for further exploration
• to organize the materials to be aesthetically pleasing
• to organize materials to help children make thoughtful decisions about their play
• to document children’s progress: (through portfolios and Bright Wheel)
• to help children see the connections in learning and experiences
• to help children express their knowledge through representational work
• to form a “collective” among other teachers and parents
• to have a dialogue about the projects with parents and other teachers
• to foster the connection between home, school and community

Projects, focus on imaginative problem solving, language and literacy, early math and scientific exploration and discovery:

• can emerge from children’s ideas and/or interests
• can be invited/provoked by teachers
• can be introduced by teachers knowing what is of interest to children: shadows, puddles, tall buildings, construction sites, nature, etc.
• should be long enough to develop over time, to discuss new ideas, to negotiate over, to induce conflicts, to revisit, to see progress, to see movement of ideas
• should be concrete, personal from real experiences, important to children, should be “large” enough for diversity of ideas and rich in interpretive/representational expression

Materials, "found objects" natural and in nature:

• explore first: what is this material, what does it do, before what can I do with the material
• should have variation in color, texture, pattern: help children “see” the colors, tones, hues; help children “feel” the texture, the similarities and differences
• should be presented in an artistic manner–it too should be aesthetically pleasing to look at–it should invite you to touch, admire, inspire
• should be revisited throughout many projects to help children see the possibilities