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 Children ages 6-weeks to 6-years participate in classes according to development level. Each class is designed to meet the educational, therapeutic, and emotional needs of each child, and approximately 90 of the 135 children in Special Care's programs participate in our early childhood education classrooms.
Each child has an individual education plan and participates in actvities designed for social-emotional, physical, language, and cognitive development.  Teachers, therapists, and parents work together to design short- and long-term goals for each child. Teachers and therapists also work closely for optimal carryover between therapy and classroom actvities.
Special Care's classroom management style and social-emotional curriculum utilizes Dr. Becky Bailey's Conscious Discipline methods which are based on current brain research, child development information, and developmentally appropriate practices (visit www.consciousdiscipline.com for information). Conscious Discipline specifically teaches anger management, helpfulness (pro-social skills), assertiveness, impulse control, cooperation, empathy, and problem solving.  One of the main approaches is to focus on affirming desired behaviors and encourage children to see the important role they play in running an effective classroom. Children's heightened self-esteem is central in Special Care's program, and expressions such as "I'm doing it!" and "I can help" have been even more frequent since integrating Conscious Discipline into our curriculum.
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