As we move from “Home to School” to “Coming Together”, our curriculum focuses on establishing a classroom community where everyone feels a sense of belonging and value.

In October of 2022, the Garden Gate Board of Directors voted to form a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee for the purpose of developing and implementing policies and practices that support an inclusive and equitable school community. This ongoing work has had a significant impact on our teachers, our curriculum and our children.

Our creative, innovative approach to early childhood education supports individual learning styles and differences. Focusing first and foremost on the social and emotional wellbeing of our children, we look to provide a flexible, relationship-driven learning environment.

In our kindergarten classroom, we focus on giving children the real skills and the independence to solve real life problems with concrete solutions.

Engagement with the arts - whether it’s viewing works in the gallery, creating in our studio classrooms, engaging with children’s literature, participating in musical experiences or writing stories and poetry - inspires and supports creativity in deep and meaningful ways.

Childhood is not merely a preparation for adulthood or for the next stage in learning. Friedrich Froebel, creator of the concept of kindergarten, laid the foundation for modern education based on the recognition that children have unique needs and capabilities.

At Garden Gate children spend hours outdoors each day - our playground is designed as an outdoor studio and our daily walks through the Featherstone campus and MVLandbank trails inspire curiosity and wonder.

Back to school means making connections from home to school and coming together as a learning community.

We see our children as artists and makers who use creative languages to communicate and share questions, ideas and theories. Our move to Featherstone Center for the Arts in 2022 strengthened this image of the child and has inspired us to deepen our practice and further our engagement with the arts.

Covid has invited us to reflect on and rethink everything we have known early care and education to be. Rather than limiting our program with new Covid restrictions, we have allowed ourselves to reimagine a program at Garden Gate that truly honors childhood and supports children in ways that will have the greatest impact on their early learning and development. 2021 has been both exhausting and exhilarating and we have leaned heavily into our relationships - with the children, with families, with coworkers and colleagues, with Featherstone and within the community - to bring out the best in our program.

We are excited to announce that we have begun enrolling for our new combined Kindergarten/Preschool program.

Our teachers keep showing up, day after day, bringing their best selves to this challenging, yet rewarding, work. For this we are extremely grateful.

A year of unexpected challenges and unexpected blessings.

One of the greatest silver linings we have enjoyed has been the deepening community connection with our local arts center that has developed in direct response to new covid reopening guidelines.

The Wonder of Learning is a traveling exhibition from the schools in Reggio Emilia, Italy. The exhibit highlights the pedagogical practices of the approach and seeks to engage teachers, families, children, and the general public in reflecting on the possibility of education for even the youngest of children.

There it was. The cultural context in which this approach to education is embedded. The joyful, noisy, emotional, poetic context.