Preschool Programs

Cleary School for the Deaf offers preschool classes for students whose mode of communication is Listening and Spoken Language, or Sign Language. The goal of all of our preschool classrooms is to provide learning experiences that are hands-on, and foster thinking and communication. Through individual and small group activities, our young students are provided with a rich language environment that embeds literacy, exploration, inquiry, and pre-math concepts necessary to support the thinking and language of a young learner’s social, emotional, and academic development.

Cleary School’s Listening and Spoken language preschool classroom offers a small 8:1:1 integrated classroom for our 3 year olds and new listeners. Many of the preschoolers by age four transition into an integrated pre-Kindergarten class that consists of a “50/50” ratio of children with hearing loss and children with typical hearing. This classroom is taught collaboratively with two specialists. The children with hearing loss work toward their IEP goals while learning, interacting, and playing with their typical hearing peers. The children with hearing loss benefit from having language and conversational models of typically developing children to expand the boundaries of their own language skills.

For those students who will be using Sign Language, classes consist of similar peers in a small student staff ratio of 6:1:1 or 6:1:2, depending on the needs of the children. These classrooms have specially qualified teachers who use Sign Language throughout the day. Children who need additional support to develop spoken or sign language, visual communication systems such as PECS and augmentative devices are used on an individual basis.

Our Preschool Programs Offer: