Upcoming Events
2/1/2012
- Teacher Workday No School2/9/2012
2/16/2012
2/20/2012
School Announcements
FAT SATURDAY PARTY
The ECC is having a party that you don't want to miss!
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 11TH
at the Riverside Grill, 6-10
For more informatio go to: www.fatsaturday.org
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 11TH
at the Riverside Grill, 6-10
For more informatio go to: www.fatsaturday.org
ORANGES, ORANGES ORANGES!
ECC still has gift baskets and boxes of delicious oranges...
OPENINGS!
The Early Childhood Center has openings.
Call Linda at 923-5846 to find out more and reserve a space.
Come visit us at our lovely spot on the mesa.
Call Linda at 923-5846 to find out more and reserve a space.
Come visit us at our lovely spot on the mesa.
ANNUAL FUND
Our Annual Fund is key to the success and future of the Early Child Center and your children. Unfortunately, current tuition only covers 77% of the actual cost to educate the students at the ECC. We have to supplement that income to maintain our low student-teacher ratio and continue to be able to offer the wide variety of educational programming.
Thank You to everyone who has already contributed:
Jennifer & James Benvenuto
Lee & Keith Bryant
Julie Goldstein & Tony O'Rourke
Michele & Ross Jacobs
Kirsten & Penn Newhard
Janie Rich & Scott Munro
Anita Rayburn & Chris Tudge
Christina & Grant Sharp
Thank You to everyone who has already contributed:
Jennifer & James Benvenuto
Lee & Keith Bryant
Julie Goldstein & Tony O'Rourke
Michele & Ross Jacobs
Kirsten & Penn Newhard
Janie Rich & Scott Munro
Anita Rayburn & Chris Tudge
Christina & Grant Sharp
About the Early Childhood Center
The Early Childhood Center (ECC) is a private preschool that celebrates children’s innate curiosity as their inspiration for learning. Established in 1989, the school’s mission is to provide children ages 1 1/2 to 5 years with a rich learning environment that promotes self-confidence, self-discipline, and the desire for lifelong learning.
The child’s experience lies at the heart of the ECC. School staffcreate educational opportunities that are student-driven rather than teacher-directed. This approach:
- builds on each child’s strengths and most absorbing interests;
- challenges children’s intellectual capacity;
- respects and accepts individual differences and diversity; and
- offers a family atmosphere with opportunities for parents to become actively involved in their child’s learning.
The directors of the ECC have developed an innovative approach which turns the ordinary preschool curriculum on its head. Teachers use observation of children at play and work to identify students’ interests and strengths and then structure learning opportunities around these interests. In essence, the school creates the curriculum to suit the individual child, instead of trying to create interest in a curriculum deemed “suitable.”
Classroom activities like making life-size, full body images of oneself or working in clay, and projects like turning the entire classroom into a medieval castle surrounded by a moat crawling with crocodiles are the backbone of the children’s and teacher’s learning experiences. Each project evolves from a chance event, or an idea posed by child, or an interaction between a child and teacher. Our goal is to empower children to feel like researchers in their learning, to explore their environment and to make meaningful discoveries about the world around them. The role of the teacher is to help in the process of initiating projects, researching materials to enrich the experience, answer questions and have meaningful dialogue with the children, observe children to see where to begin or broaden their interests, and to document the work that is taking place.
Children and teachers create a portfolio to show the work and the process of learning taking place throughout the year. The documentation process has several functions:
- to make parents are aware of their children’s experience and maintains parental involvement;
- to help teachers understand the children more deeply and to reflect on their own practices thus promoting their professional growth;
- to facilitate communication and exchange of ideas among educators and children; and
- to show children their work is valued.
Mission & Philosophy
MISSION, PHILOSOPHY AND PROGRAM AT THE EARLY CHILDHOOD CENTER
At the Early Childhood Center (ECC) we believe that the child’s innate curiosity stimulates the inspiration for learning. The mission of the non-profit Early Childhood Center is to provide children aged 1 ½-5 years a rich learning environment which promotes self-confidence, self-discipline, and the desire for life-long learning.
The child’s experience lies at the heart of the Early Childhood Center. We strive to create educational opportunities that are student-driven rather than teacher directed. Our teachers have developed an innovative approach, using observation of children’s play as a tool for identifying students’ interest around which the teachers structure learning opportunities. At the ECC, we create the curriculum to suit the child’s interest, instead of trying to create interest in a curriculum deemed “suitable.”
We believe in fostering an environment which:
· builds on each child’s strengths and most absorbing interests;
· challenges children’s intellectual capacity;
· respects and accepts individual differences and diversity; and
· offers a family atmosphere with opportunities for parents to become actively involved in their child’s learning.
The Early Childhood Center was established in 1988 as a part of the Aspen Community School complex. The center was founded by Bertha Campbell and a group of Woody Creek parents. They were looking for a preschool and toddler program that was philosophically aligned with the Aspen Community School. We consider our program the foundation of the philosophical belief in child-centered, experiential, integrated learning. COMPASS provides the umbrella 501c3 nonprofit status to the ECC. We are one of the projects of COMPASS which includes the two charter schools, Aspen Community and Carbondale Community Schools.
All the members of the COMPASS community recognize the value of life-long learning with the premise that all learning is an interconnected web rather than a series of disconnected and unrelated events. The ideology is a commitment to the process of learning that arises naturally through experience and active involvement in the world around the learner and teacher/mentor. The participants understand that the paths to acquiring knowledge are as diverse as each individual. The essence of the relationship between the learner and educator is based on respect for each individual’s contribution to the process of creating and refining those pathways to discovery and knowledge about ourselves, our responsibility to our community and to the future sustainability of a healthy, peaceful world.
