Day Care / Preschool in Encino, CA

Caterpillar Cottage Preschool, Lake Balboa:
Caterpillar Cottage Preschool, in the Los Angeles district of Encino, is a neighborhood-based early childhood education school that provides a play-based preschool program with an eclectic curriculum for kids ages 2.5 - 5 years. Our school is located in Lake Balboa at 17214 Cantlay Street, southern San Fernando Valley. Our programs are open to children from Los Angeles communities that include West Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Encino, Van Nuys, Reseda, Northridge and North Hills.

Morning Preschool & Kindergarten Readiness Programs - 8am to 12 noon:
- 2 Day Preschool (Tuesday, Thursday)
- 3 Day Preschool (Monday, Wednesday, Friday)
- 5 Day Preschool (Monday through Friday)

Integrated Curriculum:
When children play with a grocery shopping activity center, for example, pretending to purchase food or collect money from their friends, they learn about quantity, community, economics, literacy, and sequence (when we go shopping, first we plan what to buy, then we gather the items, and finally we buy them). In curriculas that are not integrated, however, learning is often fragmented and compartmentalized making new knowledge less meaningful and harder to retain. Just like us, children can better absorb a variety of concepts when they learn through pertinent, practical, hands-on exploration. 

Kindergarten Rediness Program:
Ready children have basic letter/sound identification skills and are comfortable with counting, quantity, shapes, colors, sorting, and understanding sequences of time. They have fine and gross motor skills and exhibit them by being able to use scissors and crayons in the classroom, and climb and jump on the playground.

Social skills for entering Kindergarten also include:
- communicating with and getting along with other children,
- beginning to regulate their emotions, and
- following simple multi-step directions,
- easily separating from parents.

Activities:
Activities are selected and provided in a variety of forms (small group projects, free choice, individual) and are tailored to best support the learning and level of each child enrolled at Caterpillar Cottage.