Pre-School Head Teacher, The Children’s Community School

Posted by The Children's Community School on April 2, 2024

Head Teachers are committed educators and lifelong learners who work as a team to support children, families, colleagues, and the school. Head Teachers hold primary responsibility for care of children in the mornings and early afternoons; creating and implementing high-quality curriculum; assessing and communicating about the needs of children; and communicating with families. They share responsibility for building relationships with and teaching children, as well as guiding their behavior.

This role will work in a pre-school/PreK classroom with children between the ages of 3 and 5.

Responsibilities

• Ensure health and safety—ensure that children are physically cared for and safe, including supervision, feeding, bathrooming, and ensuring a safe environment
• Relationships with children—build trusting, communicative, supportive relationships with children; actively engage children in learning and school activities
• Guide behavior—support children in learning to behave in self-controlled, socially-appropriate ways, using methods in line with the school’s teaching philosophy
• Create positive environments—create classroom routines and culture that support a learning community; create physical environments (materials, layouts) that support a learning community
• Create and implement curriculum—plan and implement developmentally appropriate, play-based, emergent, project-based curriculum that continually supports children’s growth in all learning areas; create documentation of learning
• Assess children—observe and document children’s strengths and needs; communicate with families about their children’s development, both in planned formal contexts (conferences, written narratives) and unplanned or informal contexts (phone calls and meetings as needed); integrate plans to meet children’s needs through curriculum
• Build relationships with families—serve as the primary point of contact between the family and the school; communicate with families as a group (e.g. writing daily emails, school events) and as individuals (e.g. assessment and other communication as needed); work to build relationships between families and the school, and between families and each other
• Work collaboratively with colleagues—cooperate with other teachers (both on the teaching team and throughout the program) and administrators in implementing all aspects of the job responsibilities; collaborate with non-staff adults (e.g. subs, student teachers, service providers, etc.) to meet the needs of children and colleagues
• Supervise junior teaching staff—In classrooms with associate/assistant/student teachers, Head Teachers serve as mentors, supports, and direct supervisors
• Demonstrate leadership—Work toward the best interests of the school; model professionalism; actively seek opportunities for individual and collective growth
• Continually improve practice—In an ongoing manner, evaluate and improve existing teaching practices, and seek and implement new practices; learn collaboratively with colleagues and children
• Care for the school—Ensure that the school and its spaces stay clean, organized, safe, and prepared for children’s use
• Communicate—Participate in frequent, regular, prompt, and respectful communication with colleagues and families, including in-person, phone, and email communications
• Demonstrate good work habits—including reliability, flexibility, and communication

Full job description and application information.