Ms. Deb

I earned my BA in Early Childhood Education from Salem State University and I’ve been working with young children ever since. Over the course of my career I have been an Educator, operating my own Family Child Care program in California when my children were younger. I then spent over a decade as a Developmental Specialist working in Early Intervention to help young children and families. My licensed Family Child Care program will cater to children ages one to three, providing development and learning activities specifically tailored to those formative years.

A child learns by building on the skills that they have mastered. It is important to know what stage a child is in for each area of development and what they should be able to do next developmentally. Each child is unique and should never be compared to another child. All activities should be designed to promote development in all areas of development. Speech, gross and fine motor, social/emotional development, as well as Cognition and Self Help Skills are all important areas of development to constantly be building on. I work with children between the ages of 2 months and 3 years because I want to specialize in Infant/ Toddler Development. The child’s brain is learning everything and being completely formed by the age of three years old. It is so vital that a child learns to trust his environment and that his needs will be met. In very young children self help skills include hand washing, tooth brushing, beginning to learn simple dressing skills such as putting on and taking off their shirt. Problem solving is mastered through play such as cause/effect toys where a child learns that if they do one thing it will make something else happen. They master puzzles and shape sorters, blocks, and other toys all age appropriate for their ages and skill levels. Pro-Social activities and play will be encouraged throughout the day. Sharing with friends will be encouraged while a child learns a healthy concept of “mine and “me”. Speech and communication will be the basis of the day with speech modeled and encouraged. Songs and books will be constant throughout the day. Motor skills are developed through self feeding,building blocks, using crayons, markers and paint brushes. Doing activities with crawling, kneeling,standing on one foot and another, walking, and running are all activities to develop large muscles.