Experience the DEL Difference
Day Early Learning is a network of premier, community-based early learning centers that advance the science of early education, invest in the next generation of teachers and instill essential skills in children.
Our Approach
Everything we do is aimed at nurturing each child’s social, emotional and educational needs. Our ultimate goal is not only to prepare children for kindergarten, but also to inspire a lifelong learning journey.
And that’s exactly what learning is at our centers—a journey. Each child will be an active participant in their education, spending time both in enriching classrooms and outdoors exploring the world. Each Day Early Learning student gains knowledge through hands-on experiences that spark playful curiosity and meaningful growth.
Competent and effective teachers ensure that each child will be in the best hands possible. Our team benefits from ongoing professional development and classroom coaching. Backed by a research-based curriculum, learning in our classrooms is geared toward a child’s age and development.
Day Early Learning is committed to ensuring every child has the building blocks to succeed in kindergarten and beyond. We measure kindergarten readiness through:
Each child’s teachers is always collecting information about their growth and development. This information will be shared with families through our mobile app. In order to accurately track a child’s progress, their teacher may request that a parent or guardian complete a questionnaire or share what they are noticing about their development during their time away from the classroom. Our educators use their understanding of the child’s development to create meaningful, engaging lessons that ignite curiosity.
In addition to measuring children’s growth, our learning environments and teaching staff are regularly assessed using classroom observation tools to ensure the highest level of teacher-child interactions. This is important because high-quality environments and teacher-child interactions encourage and promote children’s language, math, vocabulary and social skills.
How Children Learn
We believe every child...
Is Competent and Capable
Learns Through Relationships with Adults and Peers
Constructs Knowledge from Diverse Experience
Learns and Develops at a Unique and Individual Pace
Is Constantly Learning
The learning environment matters
Relationships
Responsive and caring relationships establish the secure base from which children can explore the world.
Understanding Context
Each child must be understood within the context of their individual family, community and experiences.
Positivity
Each child’s positive attributes are identified and recognized.
Play
Play is crucial to children’s physical, intellectual and social development.
Access to Resources
Each child has access to the educational resources they need to thrive.
Predictable Context
Each child thrives in the context of predictable relationships, routines and actions
Committed to Quality
When you entrust your child to Day Early Learning, you can expect a high level of quality, safety and integrity. Day Early Learning supports the highest standards of early care and education by adhering to national accreditation standards and the state of Indiana’s Paths to QUALITY™ (PTQ) Level 4 standards.
All Day Early Learning classrooms utilize The Creative Curriculum, a research-based early child care and education curriculum. The learning objectives of the curriculum are aligned with Indiana’s Early Learning Foundations and include child-focused activities that address language and literacy, math, cognitive, science, social-emotional and physical development.
Your child’s classroom will have an individualized lesson plan posted every week. Each activity on the lesson plan is purposeful and intentionally planned based on the teachers’ observations of each child in the classroom.
Regularly assessing each child’s growth and development allows teachers to tailor lessons and activities to the needs of each individual child. All Day Early Learning centers use several methods to assess each child’s growth and development including TS GOLD® observations and the Devereux Early Childhood Assessment (DECA).
Teachers must have either a bachelor’s or an associate degree in early childhood education. Classroom support professionals must have a high school diploma and CDA or 12 college credits in early care and education within two years of hire. All teachers are trained in Universal Precautions, first aid and CPR.
Children at Day Early Learning receive a healthy breakfast, lunch and two snacks a day at our centers. Meals are designed to be balanced and include fresh fruits, vegetables and whole grains, while limiting the amount of sugars and processed foods. Weekly menus are posted in your center.
Our menus are reviewed by a certified nutritionist, approved by the Indiana Department of Education and meet the Gold Standard from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) for Child Nutrition Programs. Additionally, our culinary team members are Serv-Safe certified to ensure food safety.
You are your child’s first and most important teacher. You are always welcome at Day Early Learning. Feel free to visit the center and participate in special programs and activities. Your participation is important to your child’s success.
Your child’s health and safety are our top priority, and we work to prevent illnesses through our health and safety policies. When illnesses do occur, school leaders will inform parents of the illness, symptoms and incubation period, per Indiana State Licensing regulations. We take extra care to sanitize classroom surfaces, toys and common use items whenever an illness is confirmed in a classroom.