By Dr. Kristi Smith, Director of Education and Training at Children’s Lighthouse Franchise Company
As a leading franchise in the early education space, we understand the importance a strong curriculum can play in the success of our franchisees. The mission of Children’s Lighthouse Franchise Company (CLFC) is to give our franchisees the tools, guidance and opportunity to operate a profitable business that is designed to give children a safe, loving place to learn, make friends and build confidence. We do this by partnering with parents to develop children through age-appropriate curriculums designed with specific needs of children in mind. As an extension of that, we were thrilled to recently launch our new proprietary curriculum for infants and toddlers, Lighthouse BRIGHT™.
Lighthouse BRIGHT™is a unique concept in the early education field and provides relational curriculum in an environment that establishes a foundation for learning during the first two years as a child develops basic self-help skills and autonomy. Simultaneously, infants and toddlers will acquire the formative skills needed to participate in the structure of our preschool program, Lighthouse CARES™. We recognize that quality relationships during custodial care, such as feeding, diaper changing and potty training, are full of positive language communications, and are a huge part of developing healthy young brains. Because of this, we believe that custodial care, when done relationally, is an important element of the learning environment.
The release of Lighthouse BRIGHT™ completes CLFC’s Lighthouse Pathways™ Approach to Learning, structured to help children progress down the learning path as they become lifelong learners. Our three proprietary, research-based curriculums build upon each other from infancy through 12 years of age. The curriculums introduce Learning Areas in our classrooms for infants and toddlers, progressing to Learning Centers in our preschool classrooms, and Learning Labs for school-age children through our proprietary curriculums: Lighthouse BRIGHT™, Lighthouse CARES™, and xSTREAM Quest®.
The Lighthouse BRIGHT™ curriculum has been four years in the making. CLFC has extensively reviewed curriculums within the early education industry in search of a comprehensive product that met the needs of today’s families with infants and toddlers. It became evident that there wasn’t a curriculum on the market that was skills-based, used scaffolding for infants and toddlers and was also rooted in relational care, so we created one.
Stakeholder involvement was paramount in this project, so I began a series of information gathering from all partners within CLFC including franchisees and the staff and families they serve. We also hosted a live forum with CLFC Franchise Support Center staff, franchisees, and their administration teams. The results gave us the guidance to develop Lighthouse BRIGHT™ as a cutting-edge curriculum for infants and toddlers based on current real-life needs of our franchisees, the young children and families of their communities, and today’s employees.
Along with CLFC’s other curriculums, this new addition fulfills the brand’s Curriculum Philosophy Statement:
Childrens Lighthouse Franchise Company is an accredited early learning organization that is committed to excellence in early childhood education. All children deserve a safe environment that allows them to be expressive, independent learners as they develop in their own learning styles. We strive to deliver such an environment by providing opportunities for individualized skill development, group learning, self-regulation, and inquiry-based investigation.
Lighthouse BRIGHT™ also instills “Five C’s” that are important to Childrens Lighthouse Franchise Company:
- Confidence – We believe in building confident, independent children through inquiry-based, hands-on learning and positive interactions with highly trained teachers. We guide each child as a dignified individual with their own unique set of passions, strengths, talents, and creativity on a pathway of educational excellence. We are committed to fulfilling our Brand Purpose of building confident children who make a positive impact on the world.
- Connection – We believe in being community stakeholders with strong relationships within our schools and the neighborhoods around us. An emphasis on teamwork between school and home is paramount in developing healthy brains, bodies, and best behaviors in children. At each Children’s Lighthouse Early Learning School, children are taught character-building lessons and are empowered to become confident, well-rounded individuals within their global communities.
- Consistency – We believe that consistency for children is important, now more than ever, based on current research. Consistency supports brain connection and emotional stability in a more meaningful way for children. To provide emotional support and deepen each child’s learning, Children’s Lighthouse Early Learning Schools are committed to providing consistent classroom environments, schedules, learning opportunities, and teacher interactions.
- Continuous Improvement – We believe that consistent expectations, environments, interactions, routines, and relationships develop brain connection and emotional stability in a more meaningful way for children. Children’s Lighthouse Early Learning Schools are committed to providing consistent classroom environments, schedules, learning opportunities, and teacher interactions to deepen each child’s learning.
- Curriculum – We believe our comprehensive proprietary curriculums provide a pathway from infancy to childhood to prepare children for the real world. Infants develop their individuality as they grow to be self-regulating toddlers with our Lighthouse BRIGHT™ curriculum through skill-focused, development-based learning. In our preschool classrooms, children explore using higher-thinking skills with components like Centers That Shine, Learning Lesson Session, and 3E Outdoor within our Lighthouse CARESTM This combination of large group instruction, small group instruction, and individualized learning prepares children for elementary school readiness. For our school-age children, the exciting xSTREAM Quest® curriculum allows for self-managed learning experiences that encourage freedom of choice and independence. Our early learning professionals are committed to teaching strong social-emotional and communication skills. Our Lighthouse Pathways™ approach to Learning is followed to fulfill our Brand Promise of creating a comfortable environment for children to become lifelong learners with strong friendships within their communities.
Our curriculum specialists within the CLFC’s Department of Education and Training are experts in their fields and lifelong students of early childhood education, research, and best practices. Because of their dedication and expertise, our franchisees, their teams and the families that they serve are able to benefit from our proprietary curriculums like Lighthouse BRIGHT™. At the end of the day, the success of the students in our care is our number one priority, and we’re thankful to be able to provide an educational foundation that sets our future leaders up for success.
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