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Chicago, IL
Black Bear Preschool

Parents at this school would recommend this school to other parents.

Review this preschool

neighborhood: North Center ·  Telephone: (773) 244-0700  · Website: blackbearpreschool.com

• Summary
• General Info
• School Philosophy
  & Day-in-the-Life
• Curriculum &
  Teaching Approach
• Quality of
  Teaching
• Home/School
  Connection
• Discipline,
  Health & Safety
• Ages, Schedule
  & Tuition
• Application &
  Admissions
• Kindergarten
  Placement&Tips

General Approach to Learning

	Play-based
	Play-based with some structure
	Predominantly teacher-led instruction
	Montessori
	Waldorf
	Co-op
	Reggio-Emilia

source:

Director's Comments

Experiential, engaged, multi-sensory, fun, back door with intentions at every level.

Social Skills & Work Habits

OVERALL RATING (4.4)
This school has increased my child's:
Ability to listen and follow directions
Ability to sit still for longer periods of time
Ability to be a part of a group of children
Self-sufficiency and independence
Awareness of others’ feelings
Cooperation with other children

source:

Curriculum and Teaching Approach

	PLAY-BASED	PLAY-BASED WITH SOME STRUCTURE	MOSTLY TEACHER LED	NOT FORMALLY IN CURRICULUM	CONDUCIVE ENVIRONMENT
Language					Yes
Oral language			-	-	n/a
Nursery rhymes, poems, songs			-	-	n/a
Storybook reading			-	-	n/a
Emerging literacy skills			-	-	n/a
Cognitive Development					n/a
Math and number sense			-	-	Yes
Time & space			-	-	Yes
Sci. reasoning/physical world			-	-	Yes
Music			-	-	Yes
Visual arts			-	-	Yes
Physical activity			-	-	Yes
Other subjects taught	symbols and sounds numbers and quantity concepts social language through games learning and lyrics pre-writing starts at 3.5				n/a

source:

Director's Comments

Neurologically based, multi-sensory, multi-modal, extremely small classrooms with ratios of 1-2 and 1-3 max. Philosophically, Piaget had it right in our opinion along with neurolgical formation/maturation based on exposure to opportunities to support strong skill sets and a solid neurological foundation.

Parents' Comments

Parent #1
Again, because of the low student-teacher ratio there is the ability for the teachers to lead while still involving 'play' in the learning. I have not stayed for a full morning of class, but do see organized 'story time' at the end of class which does have student involvement, but is definitely teacher-led (students are in chairs, listening, responding when asked). This should not imply that the environment is not playful or play-based - quite the contrary - but there is structure to the program.

Parent #2
Black Bear classes have free play time, circle time, art and craft time, snack time and story time.

Parent #3
Structure is there, large effort on teacher behalf to communicate this to all teachers each week via email. This helps to talk with my child about what is going to be coming up at school before or as we drive to school. Much improvement seen in this area- appreciate it very much.

Parent #4
What curriculum?