Overview
The following descriptions of programs offered by Community Day Care Center of Lawrence, Inc. (CDCCL), doing business as The Community Group, are quoted from the organization’s website and describe in more detail the services provided. The Community Group classifies its programs under four categories: Community Day Learning, Child Care Circuit, Community Partners Initiative, and School Management Services.
Community Day Learning
Early Head Start
The Community Day Care Early Head Start Child Care Partnership (EHS CCP) provides early, continuous, intensive, and comprehensive child development and family support services to eligible families and their infants and toddlers age birth to three years old in child care centers and age four in Family Child Care Home. EHS CCP provides many resources including educational, health, nutritional and behavioral services based on the needs of the child and family. The principles of Early Head Start are designed to nurture the relationship between the child and his or her parent and to focus on the strengths of each and every family. EHS parents are encouraged to participate in the Parent Policy Council to support the functions of the programs, approve policies, serve as a leader in the community and to develop lifelong skills.
Family Child Care
For children 2 months–12 years of age . . .
Homes in our Family Child Care (FCC) network offer learning in a nurturing, small group setting. Professional educators chosen for their experience and understanding of child development work with infants, toddlers, preschoolers, and school age children. Individual attention, flexible hours, a variety of locations, and a nursery school large group experience for preschoolers are all benefits of the program.
Learning in FCC homes is guided by Creative Curriculum®, which provides a framework for creating an environment that moves and flows with children’s developing interests and changing needs. Children learn about themselves and the world around them; teacher-caregivers observe and monitor the healthy development of children.
Community Day Learning Family Child Care educators are licensed, visited by Community Day Learning staff, and receive training and development at regularly occurring meetings. Educators also hold the Child Development Associate (CDA) credential or are enrolled in a college degree program. The CDA credentialing program marks the ability to meet the specific needs of children and work with parents and other adults to nurture children's physical, social, emotional, and intellectual growth in a child development framework. Many of the network’s providers are also bilingual in Spanish and English.
A full or partial day program can be coordinated with parents’ schedules.
Family FCC Educators homes range in size up to a maximum of 6 children or up to 10 children if the FCC Educator is licensed accordingly and has a full-time licensed assistant.
Kindergarten
For children 5 years old . . .
Kindergarteners are ready to expand their early learning and develop the foundational skills necessary for a successful elementary experience. Our curricula include Journeys (Literacy), Fundations (Phonemic Awareness), Lucy Calkins’ Writing Workshop (Writing), and enVision (Math). Classroom learning is extended through field trips and a summer camp experience. . . .
A full or partial day program can be coordinated with parents’ schedules; a summer program is available.
Kindergarten classrooms are led by certified, highly qualified teachers and have 2 teachers with up to 25 students.
Lawrence Early Achievement Partnership
The Lawrence community was awarded a grant through the U.S. Department of Education to expand preschool across the city. The Lawrence Early Achievement Partnership (LEAP) was created to add 130 preschool seats for eligible children. This is a partnership between The Community Group (TCG), Greater Lawrence Community Action Council, Head Start, and Lawrence Public Schools (LPS).
The program will use the Massachusetts preschool curriculum framework and will prepare students to be successful in kindergarten.
Teen Parent Infant/Toddler
For children 2 months–3 years, 9 months . . .
The Teen Parent Infant/Toddler Program provides nurturing, developmentally appropriate care to the children of teen parents who are attending school or high school / GED graduates who are working. The program has two components: early education and care for infants and toddlers offered in the center-based setting or family child care provider homes and support for young mothers.
Toddler
For children 15 months–2 years, 9 months . . .
Toddlers thrive in an environment that supports language, socialization, and their growing sense of independence. Teacher-caregivers give individual attention to toddlers, guiding them through activities and interactions in small groups.
Preschool
Preschool—For children 2 years, 9 months–3 years, 11 months
Pre-Kindergarten—For children 4–5 years (if turning 5 after September 1) . . .
As toddlers develop into preschoolers, they are ready for new challenges. Social and skill-based learning helps preschoolers prepare for success in school. Students develop foundational skills, including literacy, math, and science, while advancing in important social learning, including cooperation, sharing, interacting with others, and understanding emotions. Preschoolers learn about themselves and the world around them through independent, small group, and large group explorations. Classroom learning is extended through on-site visits from museums, storytellers, and music and movement teachers in addition to explorations during field trips.
School Age
For children in kindergarten through 12 years of age . . .
Latchkey Enrichment Program
The Latchkey Enrichment Program is designed to be a fun, supportive environment that supports the academic, social, and physical development of students. The program uses out-of-school time to extend learning and enrich students’ experiences through homework help, reading time, art activities, games, computer lab use, violin lessons, physical activities, field trips, and special events. The Junior Achievement® curriculum, which includes hands-on activities to inspire and prepare young people to succeed in a global economy, and SPARK, a program that helps students develop motor skills, movement knowledge, and social and personal skills to encourage lifelong healthy behaviors, are also incorporated into programming.
21st Century Community Learning Centers
In partnership with Lawrence Public Schools, Community Day Learning is the recipient of a grant from the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education to operate out-of-school time programs that extend student learning beyond the school day. Fun, multidisciplinary projects engage students while strengthening their grasp of academic concepts.
Project-based learning takes place in sessions during the year and has incorporated elements from a range of curricula and structured programs:
- Engineering Adventures™ from the Museum of Science, Boston, a curriculum created for out-of-school time programs that introduces students to the engineering design process as they ask questions, imagine, plan, create, and improve solutions to real-world problems
- Strength and Power in Nutrition (SPIN): a health and consumer program of UMass for adolescents emphasizing personal power and healthy choices
- SPARK, a program that helps students develop motor skills, movement knowledge, and social and personal skills to encourage lifelong healthy behaviors
- Scratch, a graphical programming system developed by MIT Media Lab
- Beyond the Chalkboard from the Children's Museum, Boston, which covers a range of subjects, including science, literacy, culture, art, health, math, and engineering in ways that support what's learned during the school day
Past project themes have included the Merrimack River; physical fitness and health; mock trials; engineering, 3D building, and other STEM topics; bicycle safety; astronomy; book clubs; cooking; fairy tales and fables; Fit Math; insects; Native Americans; origami; poetry slams; rain forests; Reader’s Theater; rockets; sailing and kayaking; and tide pools. Parents and the school community convene for special presentations that showcase student work.
Community Partners Initiative
At Community Partners Initiative, we give teachers and schools the support they need to increase student achievement and communicate their success. At the heart of our initiative is the idea that data should inform instruction, and we, as educators, should be partners sharing our best educational practices. Our data and management services allow school leaders to focus on their most important priorities: students, teachers, and communities.
Child Care Circuit
According to Child Care Circuit’s website,
Child Care Circuit is a Massachusetts based private nonprofit organization providing child care referrals, training and parent & provider services locally and nationwide. . . .
Child Care Circuit maintains a comprehensive database of licensed child care providers and resources. Various memberships are available to parents and employers that include access to updated information as well as to other Child Care Circuit resources. . . .
The Massachusetts Department of Early Education and Care (EEC) provides financial assistance to eligible families seeking care at early education and care or out of school time programs. Families must generally meet income and activity requirements to be eligible for EEC financial assistance.
School Management Services
CDCCL is the management agent for three community day charter public schools in Lawrence that provide education for kindergarten through eighth grade. The schools are R. Kingman Webster, Prospect, and Gateway.
CDCCL also operates a public elementary school in Lawrence, Community Day Arlington Elementary School, which serves kindergarten through fourth-grade students. The elementary school uses methods developed at the charter schools.
| Date published: | April 3, 2020 |
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