Patton College of Education sends students into special needs classroom for firsthand experiences.
A portion of Desiree Young’s day is spent in a world where wolves blow down structures, brick houses are built in a day and pigs make threats with their chin hairs.
Young, a professional intern at Ohio University’s Child Development Center and a senior studying early childhood education, recounts the Three Little Pigs to children with the extra play time she allocates in her daily lesson plans.
“You write your lesson plans the way you’d want a substitute to carry them out, so it has to be very detailed,” she said.
The Patton College of Education partners with the center to offer the internship program to all seniors and four other classes that give students firsthand experience in early childhood education.
Every week at the center, interns create “experience journals,” where they recount what their classes focused on in addition to the 30-plus lesson plans they craft each week, Young said.
“They’re getting ready to do everything that you would do to run a classroom,” said Cathy Waller, director of the center.
The center operates on a budget of $1,017,008 for fiscal year 2014. About 90 percent of that budget is allocated to wages, salaries and benefits for employees, including the center’s 14 full-time “master” teachers.
Of those funds, $260,460 are allocated from OU’s General Fund.
Located in The Ridges’ former horse barn, the center is home to slightly more than 90 children on weekdays from 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
These days, the center has little resemblance to the old barn, aside from the pet rabbits in one of the preschool rooms. The pastel walls are covered with artwork created by the children and a few local artists.
The center, which moved to The Ridges in 2001, offers classes for separate age ranges — two classes apiece for infants and toddlers and three for preschoolers, Waller said.
Almost 90 percent of the children who attend daycare at the center have parents employed or associated with the university, though there are no additional discounts for OU employees, Waller said.
Parents pay for the daycare on a sliding scale based on their income. There is a 10 percent discount for families with multiple children who enroll in the program.
The program operates under the “Reggio Emilia,” philosophy, which emphasizes the importance of community involvement to raise children. That’s why the center partners with local organizations, Waller said.
A favorite activity for some children are “Magic Moments,” or presentations by especially skilled parents or friends of the center.
In the past, children have listened to an opera singer, watched OU dance students perform and a Marching 110 parade, Waller said.
“Anybody who has a talent or skill they’d be willing to share with us in some way, we’re looking to have them,” she said.
The Reggio Emilia philosophy inspired the center’s garden, which includes zucchini and tomatoes that children use to make food such as salsa. It also emphasizes learning about math, science and the environment.
John McCarthy, associate director of communication sciences and disorders, currently takes his son to the center after he began conducting research with the children there in 2005.
McCarthy observes children unaffected by disabilities to determine alternative ways to communicate for those unable to talk because of disorders such as autism, cerebral palsy or brain damage.
“We can embrace the way that (the children) view the world and find ways to foster their development,” McCarthy said.
Tania Basta, associate professor of social and public health, said she loves the creative activities her sons Callum and Liam have come home with after spending the day at the center.
Basta said she feels lucky to have had both her sons enrolled in the center, because when she signed up her first son five years ago, she said the center had a waiting list of 50 for its 16 spots for infants.
Similar waiting lists exist today, she said.
“I really hope that OU can find funding to subsidize and grow it so that more families are able to utilize the great resource that we’ve had,” Basta said. “Every kid in Athens should get an opportunity to go there.”
