D20 or D12 Preschools (Buena Vista: renting, day cares, house)

[Antryg]

My wife and I are thinking of placing our soon to be 5 yr old son (birthday is 26 Sept) into one last year of preschool prior to Kindergarten. We'd like to find a highly academic preschool, preferable montessouri... though that is certinly negotiable. The focus is on D12 or D20, but western D11 might be an option as well, really any good preschool with 15 minutes of either Skyway or the Rockrimmon/Woodman area of Briargate. (We have not decided where we will live yet... honestly the preschool location will probably dictate the house location as either D12 or D20 has great elementary schools.) Any suggestions from the experts here?

[smdensbcs]

I'm certainly no preschool "expert" but since your post has not received a response, I'll give it a shot. As a general observation, D12 and D20 are both excellent districts and I simply presume any preschool program either District provides would be high-quality. That being said, I'm slightly taken aback by the "highly-academic" requirement. Our kids are several years past pre-school age and are testing in 99th percentile in math and reading. They were not, as far as I could tell, enrolled in a "highly-academic" pre-school. It was all about as basic as one can imagine (sorting forks/spoons for math; playing at a water table; learning to work in groups; learning how to help kids who are "different" (there were several disabled kids in the class). There were, however, three dedicated, experienced teachers for a class of 15 students. This was a public school in westside D11 (Howbert) so there was no fee involved, which was also amazing. My point is that while our kids are "highly-academic" I didn't have any sense their pre-school needed to be such. If it had been, I'd have been slightly disturbed, honestly. Perhaps I'm out-of-touch with modern parenting, but pre-school seemed to me all about getting them comfortable with being in a classroom environment, laying the foundation that school can be "fun" and not just "work," and beginning the socialization process that will help them deal with the fact that many, many kids (and, eventually, adults) out there are difficult and annoying and how do you develop skills manage that unavoidable fact of life.

We moved to District 12 before they started kindergarten and, while teacher quality/style (ahem) varies a bit, for the most part the kids are from families where academic achievement is the expectation. A "smart is cool" environment is so much better than the alternative. So good luck finding a pre-school program you like - and hopefully they won't be teaching the poor kid calculus!

[hollyt00]

I enjoy Early Connections learning centers, I've used them for a while. It gets what I am looking for in a pre-school- preparing kids for socialization while also starting pre-reading skills, learning how to write one's name, but all at the same time having a healthy set of play skills!

[Antryg]

I by no means want my kid to be doing intense academics at 5 yrs old. I just want something a bit more academic then his current day care. It seems like there are two types of facilities, those that watch kids (used to be these were called day cares) and those that spend some effort teaching them some basic reading, writing, sorting skills, etc... both seem to call themselves preschools now-days. I think re-reading my post the "highly academic" is a bit alarming, so thanks for the call out. Sometimes it takes a voice of reason to put things in perspective.

[Antryg]

As a quick poll what are thoughts on the board regarding Buena Vista elementary? Its a D11 Montessori school, pretty good reviews on great schools (not great but okay)... though I don't place too much emphasis on standardized test scores. Mainly I was wondering if anyone here had kids that went there.