The Caring Center

Mission Statement

The Caring Center is an independent, not for profit organization formed by parents and professional staff to deliver exemplary early childhood education and promote family and community development. The Caring Center strives to:

Provide an individualized, developmentally appropriate program by nurturing the whole child.
Stimulate the emotional, intellectual, physical and social growth of a child in a safe, secure environment.
Instill a love of learning and sense of community in a multi-cultural environment.
Foster a partnership between the parents and staff for the benefit of the child by creating an atmosphere of communication and understanding.
Support the personal and professional development of the staff and enable them to provide a unique and innovative experience for the children.
Act as a local, state and national advocate of early childhood education and promote a sense of community and professionalism in the field of early childhood education.

The center has earned accreditation by the National Academy of Early Childhood Program (NAEYC) and has been featured in several TV specials and numerous articles in the local and national press about childhood education.

The Caring Center encourages active participation by the family and strives for a high level of communication between parents and staff. Each classroom has a daily activity report and a monthly calendar of events distributed at the beginning of each month. Families also receive the monthly Center newsletter.

Philosophy Statement

The Caring Center believes in educating the whole child. Our philosophy is to work within the natural developmental process of children. The best education begins with a strong foundation and first-hand experience. We want our children to have positive experiences to build on, to develop self-esteem and confidence, and to have a love of learning that will last a lifetime.

It has been said that 60 percent of human intelligence is formed by the time a child is three years old, 90 percent before the age of five. Our mission at the Caring Center is to make the most of this time. Our program is designed to cultivate each stage of a child’s intellectual, emotional, social, and physical growth through a rich variety of daily activities based on the Pennsylvania Learning Standards for Early Childhood. Since children go through these stages at different rates, every program is organized with enough flexibility to allow each child to progress at his or her own pace.

Whatever the age group, the same creative thought and interest goes into everything we do at the Caring Center. When we choose activities, we look at their value for developing coordination, conceptual abilities, artistic and language skills, social cooperation, and independence. Our children grow and progress in an atmosphere of mutual respect and caring. They are encouraged to work and play cooperatively. They are challenged to try new things, but never pressured to do more than they’re ready for.

Through play your child will learn social and language skills, enhance their motor skills, build creative expression, and continue developing their understanding and processing skills. Depending on what state of development your child is at, their “play” will look very different. We encourage each child to learn, grow, and develop at their own rate and we treat each child as an individual. While there are benchmarks for development, we adapt our curriculum to fit the needs of children who may require more time to reach a milestone and for children who may need to be challenged beyond our planned curriculum.

We ask you to please remember throughout your journey with The Caring Center that all children develop at different rates. This means children’s language skills will be at different stages, their self help skills will vary, and their projects and artwork will all look different. We ask you to keep this in mind so we can meet the individual needs of your child and best foster their development within a group setting.