Early Education

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Early Ed Job Opportunities

We offer high-quality early education for Kansas City’s littlest learners. From 6 weeks to pre-kindergarten, we strive to provide a safe, caring, and educational environment.

Currently, we have limited openings in our classrooms. If this changes, we are more than happy to get you added to the waitlist so that we can reach back out to you when we do have availability for your child.

Do you want to serve our little learners in a teacher, assistant teacher or para role? Check out our job opportunities!

Join the Waitlist

ABOUT OUR PRE-K PROGRAM

The KC Pre-K Cooperative offers FREE PRE-K for 3 and 4 years olds in KC, MO who qualify for free and reduced price meals. Not eligible for free and reduced-price meals? Contact us to ask about other affordable options!

Our curriculum builds students’ academic, physical, emotional and social skills.
Our programs offer before and after school care and nutrition programs as well as connections to a host of other services in the community.
Our partner programs have earned Missouri Accreditation
Teachers are state certified just like a public school teacher
Pre-K students receive automatic enrollment in our partner elementary charter school for Kindergarten. Della Lamb’s partner school is the Kansas City International Academy.

Pre-K | Apply Online

Questions?

Email us at earlyed@dellalamb.org or call us at 816-842-8040

Early Education Program offers beneficial services for children and parents

The Early Education program began in 1897 to meet the needs of KC’s low-income widowed and single Italian mothers who needed child care while they worked. Moreover, school-age children were staying home from school to care for younger siblings, further denying themselves the education they needed to break the cycle of poverty.

Today, our state-accredited Early Education program continues to be a loving place for children to receive quality care. It serves children from six weeks of age to five years of age, and 75% are families who qualify for free or reduced lunch. Almost 40 percent of those children are from English language-learning families.

Quality Care and Education

Provide quality education child care, nutrition, nurturing and supplemental services in preparation for kindergarten.

Break the Cycle

Allow parents the freedom necessary to seek and maintain employment or adult education opportunities, which further enhance opportunities for employment or advancement.

Parenting Skills

Provide parenting educational skills to support positive parent/child interaction and positive individual and family development.

Early Ed Activities

A significant number of our families whose children participate in the Early Education program are refugee and immigrant families. They face multiple challenges when resettling in the U.S., including lack of English language skills and understanding cultural differences. Here's a brief overview of our Early Education activities:

Age appropriate

All activities are age-appropriate and based on developmental and educational needs (physical, emotional, social, language and cognitive).

Engaged exploration

Children are engaged in exploration to help build and reinforce their development and provide a foundation for future education needs.

Well-balanced meals

All classes receive a daily well-balanced breakfast, lunch and healthy morning/afternoon snacks. Our Early Ed program follows Missouri Eat Smart Program guidelines, which stress 1) providing fresh fruit and vegetable snacks and 2) education with relation to food and nutrition.

In addition, we identify and address all supplemental family needs including:

Speech therapy services and trauma-informed care.
Emergency assistance with food, clothing, rent or utility bills, etc.
Healthy early childhood development milestones through our partnership with Start at Zero and coinciding parental support.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we have limited our Early Ed program hours to 7:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Monday through Friday, nearly 50 weeks a year.

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Low-income families may qualify for subsidized fees through the Missouri Department of Family Services. Contact Della Lamb Community Services for enrollment information, 816.842.8040.