Our regular school hours are 9:00 am to 3:00 pm.
Morning Arrival
The teachers are preparing the yards between 8:30 and 8:50 am. Please do not enter the yards before 8:50 am. If you need to communicate something to your child’s teachers, they are available between 8:50 and 9:10 am. Please be brief in your communication at this time. Teachers can set a later time to talk further, as needed. If you have missed your opportunity to talk to a teacher, you may leave a note in the teacher’s staff box.
It is important that you to arrive on time. By doing so, your child has time before Morning Meeting to make friendship connections, settle into their school day, and prepare for separation. It is our experience that giving children this transition time is critical to them having a successful day at school. The arrival experience is different for each child, depending on the child, his or her experiences before coming to school, and what might be on his mind. This is the time when teachers greet each child to make a connection, and check-in with parents about their child’s emotional state. During this time, please keep your focus on your child. If you plan on leaving before Morning Meeting let your child know exactly how long you have to stay, and talk to him or her about readiness for meeting and thinking about plans for the day before you go. Give them time to fully say goodbye, and let a teacher know so the transition to school is made and they are ready for meeting.
Special Note to Nursery Parents:
If you arrive after 9:45 am, enter through the office, but please do not enter through the House. Please walk through the Mountain Yard quietly so as to not disturb the House Group or Mountain Yard Morning Meetings.
Sign In/Sign Out Sheets/Contact Information
All children in the Nursery group (Little Nursery, Big Nursery, and House Group) are required to be signed in and out on our official sign-in sheet everyday. Please use your full name when you sign. All groups including Elementary groups require a verbal check-in and check-out with your child’s teacher as well. This ensures your child’s safety. It is required that a parent accompanies the child to and from the school. If you have arranged a playover and your child will be picked up by someone other than his/her parent, please inform a teacher and make sure his or her name is on your Contact Information Card in the office. You can call, or come into the office personally to have a person added to your pick-up list. The first time someone new picks up your child, please ask them to come to the office. We will make sure they are in the book, and then escort them to the yard. Once someone is on your list and has picked up your child through the office, you can simply let the teacher in your child’s group know what the arrangement will be. Children cannot, under any circumstances, be dropped off or picked up outside school property.
Morning Meeting
Morning Meeting is the official start of the day, beginning at 9:30 in Mountain Yard and between 9:45 to 10:00 am in the Nursery Yards. Parents of younger children should plan to leave before or after Morning Meeting rather than in the middle, so as not to disrupt the meeting for the rest of the group.
Morning Meeting is an important time of the day at Play Mountain Place.
The meeting allows the teachers to check in with each child to see if they have any problems, plans or sharings, or if they have any plans that they need help with. It’s also a time when teachers will offer any plans that they have made for the day. When children miss out on this meeting, they often have difficulty throughout the school day.
We ask that if you arrive during or after Morning Meeting, you stay to support your child’s transition into the meeting or other activities. Help your child to stay focused on the meeting by sitting next to her or holding him on your lap if they cannot sit still on their own. Keep your attention on your child. Gentle encouragement to him to think of his own problems, plans, or sharings helps your child to participate. The teacher’s role in morning meeting is to keep the morning meeting flowing and to hear plans from each child before they leave the meeting area.
Each group, including Little Nursery and Big Nursery, has a Morning Meeting. For children in House Group, Primary and Elementary groups there is a stronger expectation of involvement in Morning Meeting. Children in Primary and Elementary groups who miss Morning Meeting will need a check-in with their teacher.
Ins and Outs
When dropping off or picking up your child, please always enter our school through the main front gate. Our front gate is open during drop-off and pick-up times. For security, we lock our Front Gate from 9:30 am to 2:30 pm. Please remember, people can always leave the program through the gate, even when it’s locked. However, when the gate is locked, enter through the main office door. Please always exit school through main gate unless you have office business. Please enter school through office only during locked gate hours.
Afternoon Departure Time
The school day ends at 3:00 pm.
The yards and classrooms close at 3:10 pm and our after-care program and after-school meetings for the teachers begin.
At the end of the school day parents and caregivers should focus on the following:
- Supporting your child(ren)’s transition out of school
- Gathering up any belongings
- Leaving the school grounds – including the front office area, parking lots, our front gate area and our neighbors’ yards.
If you need to check in with teachers at the end of the day, please arrive by 2:50 pm and plan to make the exchange brief. If you need a longer conversation, arrange a later phone time.
Both the alley next to school and Hargis Street are often heavily trafficked and we are concerned about the safety of children playing in front of school or on the alley-side patios after school. Also, our teaching staff and administration continue to work and have meetings between 3:00 – 6:00 pm. When families linger on school grounds (including the front of school), and come back in to use school facilities, it is disruptive of the after school work we are doing.
We understand that kids (and parents, too) may want to spend more time with each other after school. Fortunately, there is a wonderful little park not far away that many of our families use as a meeting-up place after school, Syd Kronenthal Park (on McManus). The park has swings, sand, bathrooms, drinking fountains, and a huge grassy baseball field to run in.
Information about late pick-up or our aftercare program is explained in the Administration section under Extended Day Care in this handbook.
Extended Day Care
Our regular program hours are 9:00 am to 3:00 pm. However, some families require longer hours for their work schedules. Play Mountain Place offers Extended Day Care for families who absolutely need it to fit their work schedules. We offer Before School Care from 8:30 to 9:00 am and After School Care from 3:00 to 6:00 pm.
Reservations are required. Reservations are given on a first come/first served basis with priority going to working parents with no other options for childcare and no flexibility in their work hours. Your reservation will continue month to month until you cancel with the office. Cancellations will be effective the first of the following month. There are no daily reservations for Extended Day Care.
Emergency Reserved: Space in After School Care is extremely limited. However, if you have an emergency (car trouble, stuck in traffic, unexpected work requirements) and cannot pick your child up by 3:00 pm, you may request Emergency Reserved After School Care. Please phone the office as soon as possible in these situations. Be sure to always call the office if you are running late. Daily Emergency Reserved Rate for After School Care is $20. If you have the need for Emergency Before School Care, please phone the office. Daily Emergency Reserved Rate for Before School Care is $15.
Unreserved: If you are late picking up your child at the 3:00 pm contracted pick-up time, or if you drop your child off before the contracted 8:50 am time, and have not called to inform us, you will be charged an “Unreserved” fee of $20 plus the daily rate of After Care or Before Care. After 6:00 pm pickup time, the Late Fee is $10 for each 15 minutes past the hour. Fees: Fees will be billed by monthly and are due at the beginning of each month based on the rates published in the current Fee Schedule.