_YOUR SCHOOL NAME_

Handbook

Director's Name:

Director's Phone Number (indicate whether you receive texts on this phone):

Best way to reach me: (specify phone, email or text)

Director's email:

I check my email ….. (state how often)

Preschool Address:

Weekly Preschool Schedule:

(fill in – i.e. Tuesday and Thursday from 9:30am until 12 noon)

Board of Directors or Advisors or any other staff or personnel involved……..

Basic Information on the _____ Joy School

Welcome to the ______Joy School.

Goals of the _____ Joy School

The ______Joy School is committed to providing children with a high quality preschool experience. Through a balanced combination of organized activities (crafts, songs, stories, discussions) and unstructured supervised play, the _____ Joy School strives to help children:

  • Understand and appreciate themselves and the world around them as they embrace the joys of childhood and learn to find joy in positive character-building activities
  • Build positive friendships and social skills as they learn to play well and work well with others
  • Get excited about academic learning as they learn and practice pre-academic skills involving colors, shapes, letters and numbers as well as participate in activities that build fine-motor skills (cutting, coloring, gluing, building, etc.)

(Adjust and add to this statement to create your own brief statements on the goals and purposes of your preschool)

The Joy School Curriculum

Joy School is a highly-acclaimed and developmentally appropriate preschool curriculum for three-, four- and five-year-old children. Based on the book Teaching Your Children Joy by New York Times #1 best-selling authors, Richard and Linda Eyre, the Joy School preschool program has had over 200,000 families participate since its inception over 40 years ago.

The basic idea behind Joy School is preserving and enhancing the natural “joys” of childhood while teaching children social skills and helping them develop positive character traits. Through tried-and-true stories, songs and activities, the Joy School curriculum approaches major “joys” of childhood, one by one, spending several preschool sessions on each Joy. The year starts with the most “tangible” joys, then, as children mature through the year, the Joys become a little deeper.

  • The Joy of the Body (exploring all the cool things our bodies can do, taking good care of our bodies, learning about our five senses, etc.)
  • The Joy of the Earth (appreciating and respecting the earth)
  • The Joy of Honesty and Communication (understanding the importance of telling the truth, the importance of expressing feelings appropriately, and the joy of being a good friend, using manners, and listening)
  • The Joy of Sharing and Service (realizing the joy of helping others be happy)
  • The Joy of Goals (learning the joy of taking care of our things and working hard to accomplish simple, tangible goals)
  • The Joy of Confidence (learning about making good decisions and trying new things)
  • The Joy of Wonder (cherishing and enhancing children’s natural curiosity and excitement about exploring and learning)
  • The Joy of Creativity (cherishing and enhancing children’s natural imagination and creativity)
  • The Joy of Family (appreciating and building good relationships)
  • The Joy of Uniqueness (celebrating each child’s unique abilities and attributes)

As part of your participation, you will receive a family membership that will give you online access to parent information on each of the Joys as well as all the music that we will be using in Joy School. We strongly encourage you to read the material on each Joy and to regularly listen to the Joy School music in the car and at home to reinforce what your child is learning at school and to ensure that you are familiar with what he/she is learning.

For a complete understanding of the Joy School philosophy, you can read the book Teaching Your Children Joy by Richard and Linda Eyre.

Staff

The director of the ______preschool is ______. Her background is…. (Briefly describe your experience working with children and explain briefly how you came to be running this preschool. Express your excitement about the curriculum and your commitment to doing an excellent job, etc.)

Commitment to Quality

The _____ Joy School adheres to the Joy School Quality Guidelines (included at the end of this handbook) and strives to offer children a fun and very meaningful preschool experience. (Add anything else you'd like on your commitment to high-quality education).

Licensing

The ____ Joy School is licensed by the State of ______. (if applicable). OR As an educational program that is not functioning as a daycare, the ______Joy School is not a state-licensed day care.

Policies

In order to make sure we're all on the same page, it's necessary that we all understand and work by the same basic policies. While it is my goal to make Joy School a wonderful experience for you and your child, I need your help to make this happen. I'd also like Joy School to be a wonderful experience for me – and if you follow these guidelines, you'll be making my job much more pleasant!

Hours of Operation:

The ____ Joy School operates from ___ to ___ every ___ and _____ (hours and days of the week). We encourage children to be on time so that they won't miss out on anything. We also encourage parents to be on time picking up their children. If parents are consistently late picking up their children, I may need to charge late fees.

Dates of Operation:

Joy School starts on ______and ends ______for the first semester. The second semester starts on ______and ends on ______. We’ll have a special “Joy School Graduation” at the close of the school year and will also do a special holiday program. Dates for these occasions will be confirmed later on.

Eligible Children:

The _____ Joy School is committed to serving children and their families, regardless of their background, race, creed or national origin.

To participate in the ___ Joy School, your child must be 3 years old (or 4 if you're just doing older preschoolers) by September 1 (or a date of your choosing). In addition, all Joy School children must be toilet trained and capable of going to the bathroom on their own. Please help your child work on flushing the toilet and washing his or her hands after using the toilet so that he or she will be able to do these things independently at Joy School. I'd like to avoid disrupting lessons in order to help a child in the bathroom.

Drop-off/Pick-up:

When you drop off your child, please make sure that I see your child arrive. When you pick him or her up, please ensure that I see you take him or her. If you need to have someone different pick up your child, please let me know so that I can help keep your child safe.

Please be on time to drop off and pick up your child. As I will be preparing Joy School until close to when the program begins, please do not drop off your child more than 5 minutes early. If your child arrives more than 5 minutes late, it can be disruptive to the program so we ask that you try to be on time. Please be prompt at pick up time. If you are late on a regular basis, I’ll have to start charging you for the extra time!

Absences:

If your child is going to be absent, please let me know as soon as possible. I need to be able to plan for the right number of children and I don't want to worry about where your child is.

Registration Fees and Tuition:

Each child must pay a $___ registration fee by ____ (date). This fee helps pay for supplies and for Joy School dues and materials. Your registration fee will be refunded only if you give me notice 30 days prior to the day that school begins so that I can find a child to take your child's place.

Tuition is $___/month per child.

Tuition is due on the first of each month. Tuition received after the 1st is subject to a $5 late fee. If it is more than a week late, the late fee goes up to $10. If tuition is not received by the 10th of the month, the child may be barred from attendance. Checks should be made out to ______. There will be a $25.00 fee for any checks that are returned from the bank.

If you choose to withdraw your child from school, you need to give me a 30-day notice so that I can fill his or her place. There will be no tuition refunds.

There may be times when I will need to collect a small extra fee to cover special projects or field trip expenses. I will always let you know of these fees in advance and will do everything possible to keep costs low.

Holidays:

School will not be held on the following days: (you may be able to leave off some of these holidays if you're not regularly holding Monday classes – many of these holidays are Mondays; you may want to align your school's holidays with the local school district's holidays)

  • Labor Day
  • Thanksgiving and the day after (or many programs take off the whole week of Thanksgiving)
  • The week leading up to Christmas and the week between Christmas and New Years. Christmas break goes from ____ to _____.
  • Martin Luther King Day
  • Spring Break (one week – dates ____)
  • Memorial Day
  • (add any others)

Parent Involvement:

Parents are welcome to come and observe or help any time. Your children will be so excited to see you at Joy School! Please just let me know if you’ll be coming in to observe or help so that I can plan accordingly. There will be many special occasions during the school year when I'll ask for parent helpers and I hope that you'll be able to step in and help me with holiday parties, preparing materials, and sharing your talents.

(Optional) In addition to being special helpers from time to time, any parent that wishes to commit to being a regular volunteer in the program will assist me 1 day a month (or however often you want) will receive a $___ discount off their tuition monthly tuition. This is not only a great way to save money, but it's also a wonderful opportunity to watch your child in action at school and learn first-hand about what's happening at Joy School. (Some programs make this a requirement rather than an option for parents – this is especially important for larger groups that really need a second adult to help make things run smoothly).

Parent Meetings:

Parents are strongly encouraged to attend a monthly parent meeting on the ______of the month (choose a regular date – first Tuesday, 3rd Wednesday; the first parent meeting should be in the week before your Joy School starts and can continue on that same day every month) from 8:00 – 9:00pm (or whatever time will be best for your families and you). To make these meetings more fun, I'll ask each parent to take a turn bringing treats to these meetings. At parent meetings, you'll learn about the upcoming Joy of the Month, give me your feedback on how things are going, and help plan upcoming field trips and special activities.

Children are discouraged from attending monthly meetings as they can be disruptive and can interfere with my desire to get through things quickly without distractions. I suggest that moms and dads switch off coming to monthly meetings – mom one month, dad the next so that one parent can be home with the children. I will keep these meetings short and sweet!

Snacks:

The children will have snacks as part of each Joy School session. I try to provide a good variety of healthy foods for the children. Typical snacks might include:

  • apple wedges, cheese, crackers and juice
  • whole wheat pretzels, carrot sticks and milk

As we eat snack, we often talk about what foods are good for us as well as talking about the colors, textures and flavors of food. This is also an opportunity to practice counting as children help pass out food. I strive to teach good manners and conversation skills as we eat. Children take turns helping me pass out and clean up snack.

Please be sure to inform me of any allergies or special food restrictions your child has.

(Optional) I invite parents to bring in snacks so that we can add to the variety of foods we eat at Joy School. I will pass around a sign up sheet at each parent meeting and each family will be asked to contribute a snack about once very 6 weeks (adjust to fit your plan). I ask that you provide healthy foods for snacks. Other than for birthdays, we ask that you don't bring candy, cakes, cookies or other sugary sweets for snack.

On the Joy School day that is closest to your child's birthday, we invite you to bring a special snack for the group. Please talk with me at the parent meeting before your child's birthday so that we can plan accordingly. We can set up times during the school year to celebrate summer birthdays, as close to your child's "half-birthday" as possible.

Toys:

We have lots of fun toys at Joy School. We ask that children do not bring toys from home to Joy School except when they'd like to show them off during sharing time. When a child brings toys from home, it can be hard for him or her to share that toy and it can cause disruptions and distractions.

Clothing:

Please ensure that your child wears clothing appropriate to the weather. Most Joy School days, I try to ensure that the children get to play outside and it's hard to do this if they don't have warm clothing on a chilly day or if it's very hot and they are dressed too warmly.

We do a lot of crafts and painting at Joy School and while I always use products that say they are washable, there's always the chance your child will get something on his or her clothing that is hard to get off. There's no need to dress up for Joy School. It's great to have your children come in clothes that aren't particularly special and that can get dirty as they do art projects and play outside.

The _____ Joy School is not responsible for clothing items and toys that are brought to Joy School and are damaged or lost. We do teach the children to respect each other's property and we do try to keep things in good condition.

Behavior:

One of the main goals of Joy School is to help children develop social skills and learn to get along well with each other as they have fun together. In order to meet this goal, we focus quite a bit on helping reinforce the things you're teaching your children at home – helping them to be respectful of others, helping them to be polite, helping them to think about other people's feelings, helping them to share. On the very first day of Joy School, we go over all the Joy School rules using a fun rule song. We ask that you listen to this song repeatedly with your child to help him or her learn the rules. They are probably very similar to the rules you have at home.

If a child breaks a rule at Joy School, they get a warning. If they break that rule again, I close the window with their picture on our “Joy School House” and ask them to sit aside from the group until they're ready to be a contributing and non-disruptive part of the group. I always talk to the child privately about what he or she did wrong and talk about how he or she could do better next time before having him or her rejoin the group. If two children have issues with each other that are not quickly resolved on their own, I ask them to each share their side of the story and I help them figure out what they could do next time to prevent the same sort of conflict. I do all that I can to help the children have a great time while learning to follow the rules and function effectively within our group.

If your child has had a time out (or a “window closing” as we call it) that day, I will tell you about what happened (when you come to pick up your child or in a phone call later one) so that you can follow up with your child if you wish. If your child is having ongoing behavior problems at Joy School, I will set up a time to talk with you and we can work together to come up with a plan to help your child behave more appropriately. If the child is often very disruptive to the group and the methods and ideas we've thought of and implemented together to help him or her improve are not working, we may have to consider asking your child to leave the program.

(Add to or adjust this section to go with the behavior policies you believe would be best for your group.)

Health:

To ensure the safety of everyone involved, I require children enrolled in Joy School to be up to date on their immunizations. (Check with your public health department or other preschools in the area to see which immunizations your state requires for children of the age you will be serving. In some cases, there are recommended immunizations as well as required ones. Most preschools require the required immunizations but not the recommended ones.)