Admissions

You can find our tuition rates and fee information here –Tuition Rates – 2024-25

Whole Kids Academy is open Monday – Friday from 7:30 a.m. – 6:00 p.m. Our tuition rates are all-inclusive of our hours to provide flexibility to our hard-working families, allowing you to drop off and pick up your child any time within our operating hours. Our day typically begins right around 9:00 a.m. with snacks and our morning meeting, so we encourage parents to drop off their kiddos any time between 7:30 a.m. and 9:00 a.m. Our traditional school day wraps up just around 5:00 p.m. and children enjoy an afternoon of hands-on learning centers or in the warmer months, we end our days outside at our park until 6:00 p.m.!

Our days are filled with hands-on learning, loads of opportunities for play, connection between your child and their teachers, sunshine, fresh air, and wholesome, natural foods.

Children typically arrive each morning and are greeted with a big hug and a warm welcome from their teacher. Then they will join their friends in small learning centers and play!

Around 9:00 a.m., we wash our hands and sit together for a morning snack. Our children are served fresh fruits, whole grains and organic milk, cheese, and yogurt. Teachers sit and engage with the children, having morning conversations and sharing gratitude during our meal.

We then transition to our Morning Meeting where we welcome the day with a song, provide a greeting to all of our classroom friends and learn what our classroom jobs will be for the day! Each morning we have opportunities for Spanish conversation, story books, movement, ask questions and have group discussions on our monthly learning themes.

Following our Morning Meeting, we break into small groups and learning centers where children are able to work with their teacher on early math and literacy concepts or science, STEM, and social studies activities linked to our intentional learning units.

For our learning centers, teachers involve themselves in the child’s play! They act as a guide and ask open-ended questions to foster children’s curiosity, uncover new information and really dig into their play. 

Our children enjoy having lunch with one another either in their classrooms or as a picnic-style lunch outside at our park. Lunchtime is filled with laughter, opportunities for connection, and asking questions of our friends and teachers. We practice great manners, share moments of gratitude and practice our self-help skills by cleaning up after our meal. Following lunchtime, we have our nap-time story and cozy into our cots for our afternoon nap. Our Pre-K children have the option to forgo their nap and can engage in additional activities of yoga, movement, reading, art, STEM, and kindergarten readiness  

Afternoons are filled with a nutritious snack, afternoon meetings, centers, and small group learning. We traditionally end our days at our park to get some fresh air and exercise after an action-packed day of learning!

We encourage you to learn more by viewing our Day in the Life of a Whole Kid page!

At Whole Kids Academy, we believe in the importance of a holistic approach to children’s learning and development. From our littlest infants to our Kindergarten kiddos, we work hard to provide a healthy, physical foundation for children, nurture and guide their social emotional development and challenge and stretch their academic growth.

Our infants classroom strives to be the home away from home that our littlest learners and their families crave. Our teachers provide an abundance of warmth and love to our infants as we hold them lovingly in our arms for each bottle feeding and rock them to sleep during rest times. During our active moments, we fill their days with messy art and Reggio inspired rich sensory play designed to heighten their five senses. Fun filled gross motor exercises play a key role in our curriculum to help children stretch, grow and reach new developmental mile stones!

Toddler aged children are working on their self-help skills and independence as we transition to having family style meals, walking to the park and sleeping in our toddler sized cots for rest time! Our toddlers are provided with rich vocabulary as teachers narrate their days, read stories and provide baby sign language to support children in communicating their needs and advocating for themselves. We provide loads of activities for sensory exploration, hands-on art, music and movement and opportunities to stretch our fine and gross motor skills!

Early Preschoolers are active and curious learners ready to learn about our world! Throughout the year, children are actively asking questions and increasing their learning through dynamic learning units like the Farm Study, Study of My Community, and Famous Artist Study! Teachers are right by your child’s side to support their growing independence, foster key friendships and provide loads of opportunities for open-ended play. They work towards early literacy goals of learning their ABC’s and 123’s and venture through the oh-so-fun potty training process – which is a huge leap for their growth and independence!

Our Preschool and Pre-K years are filled with wonder as children are natural and enthusiastic learners at this age. Their impulse to ask questions, investigate, explore, examine, and experiment, comes from a burning curiosity about the world and a desire to understand things. They learn, grow, and internalize through interactive experiences with each other, with adults and with real materials that require all of their senses. For this reason, our teachers spend careful time planning and incorporating diverse learning centers, with open-ended activities and hands-on materials, to use throughout the year. Learning through art, music, reading, circle activities, science experiments, cooking projects and outdoor play are some of the kids’ favorite things to do.  Children will also enjoy learning literacy and mathematics concepts such as pre-reading skills, handwriting exercises, counting, number recognition and simple addition and subtraction.  We will be working all year long to ensure your children are increasing their knowledge of the Spanish language, are well prepared for Kindergarten, and still taking every opportunity to learn through play and creative exploration with their friends and teachers. 

Our Kindergarten program provides children with a bonus year of Spanish in an immersion environment. Children in our Kindergarten program are stretched to meet their academic needs in our small classroom learning environment. Throughout the year children will work towards meeting all MCPS Kindergarten learning objectives including letter sounds, phonemic awareness, word families, sight words, writing and print, mathematic concepts, early science and social study skills, music, art, physical education, and core life skills. Project-based learning and unit studies throughout the year will provide children with opportunities to explore their individual interests and build upon their creativity, motivation, problem-solving skills, and confidence.

You can read more about each specific age group here!   

Yes, our curricula allows children the perfect balance between learning through play and academic rigor ensuring that each child will have the learned skills and knowledge needed to be successful in a Kindergarten program.

From a young age, we teach our children the importance of au, self-help skills, and independence. This remains a focal point from our Infants – K program where children are taught to be curious, confident, and independent thinkers. Throughout their time at WKA they will not only learn the core academic concepts but will grow to be kind, curious, joyful, and capable individuals.

Hands-on learning units begin in our Early Preschool classes which allow children to gain knowledge through our inquiry-based learning themes. Children will learn to question, research and discover the many answers they have to the world around them.

When children venture to our Preschool & Pre-K classrooms, we understand the importance of setting each child up for a successful academic future and have hand-selected our literacy (Estrellita) and Mathematics (Singapore Math) curricula to stretch and challenge children to reach their individual potential.

We also make sure that children have ample time to play, as this is the truest form of learning. From daily time outdoors at the park to building skills in center time, play takes a core role in our curriculum, allowing children to foster problem solving, self-confidence, motor skills, confidence, abstract thinking, negotiating skills and so much more! 

At WKA, children have the unique opportunity to be immersed in and learn the Spanish language. All of our teachers are native Spanish speakers, who provide instruction in Spanish throughout the day. Children are not taught Spanish exclusively, they will learn math, literacy, science, social studies, music, art and more but all in the Spanish language. By being immersed in another language at such a young age, our goal is to teach children not just to speak the language but to organically think in the language. We believe the benefits of speaking another language go beyond the incredible gift of communicating with an additional half a billion people, but learning a second language actually changes the brain, multiplying the number of neural pathways being used, thereby allowing individuals to become more flexible thinkers. Long-term studies indicate that bilingual children do better in school, score higher on tests and may eventually benefit from higher incomes and delayed cognitive decline in old age.

While our teachers are fully bilingual, we have found that there is often not a need to break from the language as children under the age of 5 are extremely capable to learn multiple languages as their brain is in its most flexible stage. Through song, dance, chants, and loads of visual prompts and cues children will naturally be learning core subjects of math, literacy, science, social students, and STEM along with the Spanish language.

The longer a child is enrolled in our programs the more proficient and confident in the language they will naturally become. When children first enter our program (whether they are an infant or a Pre-K student), most children are on a beginner level of the language where they begin to soak up vocabulary and a few core phrases. As they are enrolled in the program for months or years later, they grow their proficiency of the language becoming more comfortable and confident in using their Spanish to communicate with teachers and peers.

This is one of our most frequent FAQ’s as we never want our children to lose all of the knowledge they have learned over the years! We have created our Aventuras After School Enrichment and Summer Programs for just that reason. School-aged children to continue their opportunities to learn Spanish through intentional instruction, hands-on activities, loads of fun and a full immersion environment!

You can read more about our Aventuras Programs here.

Upon graduation from WKA, our children go off to attend Stone Ridge, Georgetown Day, Sidwell Friends, Green Acres, The Woods Academy, McLean School, St. Jane de Chantal, MCPS Spanish Immersion Schools, and Neighborhood Schools.

We have two classes for each age group of children at Whole Kids Academy and our class sizes grow along with your little one!

Each infant class has six children, and our toddler classes go up to 9! Our infants and toddlers are grouped by their birth date and mobility so you can guarantee that your child with always have a few peers hitting similar milestones at the same time.

Our Early Preschool classes are for children who are 2 and 3 years old, and have up to 12 friends in each class. Preschool and Pre-K classes are grouped by when your child will go to kindergarten. Each classroom will have up to 20 children with a balance of boys and girls, birth dates, developmental level, personalities, diversity, and exposure to the Spanish language, ensuring that children are engaged in an enriching learning environment.

For each classroom, there are at least two dedicated teachers with extra floating teachers to provide support, breaks, and additional coverage as needed throughout the day.

Our teachers are the heart of our school and we make a concentrated effort to hire the best! Our lead teachers not only have the education and experience required by MSDE to obtain their certifications, but embody the values we wish to instill in our children and have the heart, passion, and ability to make a difference in the lives of the children within our community.

Once a teacher joins our team at Whole Kids Academy, their learning and development doesn’t stop there. We provide loads of continuing education, mentorship and support to our teachers throughout the year, ensuring the continuing development of an exceptional team of educators.

We are proud to share that there are a handful of teachers who joined our school in our earliest of years, are still here with us today and the majority of our team has been with us since 2017 when we moved into our forever home on Executive Boulevard. While some teachers take extended leave to grow their families, return to school to further their education or relocate due to a family move, we always remain in tough and often times welcome these more tenured educators back to WKA in the future!

We know how important it is for parents to remain connected to their children while they are in attendance at WKA and have partnered with the Brightwheel app to ensure routine open communication and the sharing of every day events! Brightwheel provides parents with regular snapshots to understand and experience their child’s day with them and acts as a two-way messaging device so you can see key updates from your child’s teachers! Each day you can expect to receive updates on snacks, meals, potty notes and photos of your child engaging in their learning, playing with friends or enjoying a group learning activity!

You can also reach a friendly member of our administrative team any time by calling our front office 240.242.4957!

We understand that transitions can be tough on young children so we aim to provide as little transition as possible. Our school year runs on an annual basis from August through the following August so your child will have the benefit of enjoying a full year in the same welcoming environment with the same friends and teachers!

We encourage families to embark on the potty training journey at the right time for their child and ensure that they are committed to seeing the process through with them. There is no set age requirement for when children must be potty trained, as this is an individual and personal decision. We do however, require that children are fully potty trained prior to moving on to our Preschool and Pre-K classes, as these classes encourage increased independence, include additional learning activities and are larger sizes, which doesn’t lend itself as well to the more intimate and supportive environment necessary for successful potty training. At this time, children are able to independently recognize when they need to go to the potty, and are not needing the use of a pull-up, training pants, etc. As such, the majority of our children are potty trained in the early preschool classes, which coincides with the most developmentally appropriate time for them to begin potty training!

We believe in nurturing child’s minds and their bodies and provide a healthy start to each day. Our Snack Menu includes seasonal organic fruits and vegetables, organic dairy and high-quality proteins to be served with each morning and afternoon snack.

We also have an optional hot-lunch program for children to enjoy! We have partnered with Balducci’s Food Market to offer a hot and fresh meal to be delivered to your child each day. All meals are well balanced to include fresh, organic fruits and vegetables, whole grains, lean, quality proteins and generous portion sizes! Our hot lunch program is healthy for your child and convenient for parents! You can sign up for weekly lunches for an additional cost.

Yes! We believe that children can learn so much beyond our classroom walls and want to expose our children to many different experiences and opportunities where they will be able to develop new passions and skills.

Field Trips and in-house learning experiences are a part of our monthly learning units where children in our Early Preschool – K programs will have the opportunity to either venture off-site or welcome in a special guest for a hands-on activity to further cement their learning and development.

In addition to weekly music and art classes lead by our dedicated enrichment teachers, we have partnered with local, high quality and engaging enrichment programs to WKA so that your child may enjoy the benefit of exploring a variety of great activities here at school!

Our special events are a truly magical time where our community is able to come together to celebrate the start of our school year, special holiday or celebration! We provide monthly opportunities to connect as a classroom or full school community with our events such as Fall Harvest, Muffins with Moms or our annual Fiesta!

We go outside whether the weather at WKA and encourage outdoor play year-round! We have a beautiful large green space behind our school building which allows for ample time outdoors. Children may visit our Boat & House Park, Outdoor Centers Play Area, Trike Park or Blacktop Area for a full hour each morning and each afternoon. Our Park Rotation Schedule ensures that children are able to enjoy all of these parks with their classmates and teachers each week and is structured in a way that allows for both free play and organized team games or activities that enhance gross motor skills!

We do our best to meet the individual scheduling needs of each family and will provide part-time schedules whenever possible. Children may enroll part-time either 2 or 3 days per week and can enjoy the full day (from 7:30 a.m. – 6:00 p.m.) at WKA on their designated enrollment dates.

Children who are enrolled in part-time schedules are paired with another family seeking part-time enrollment and attend school on complimentary dates. For example, if your child is enrolled on a Monday, Tuesday schedule, we would pair them with another part-time family who is enrolled on a Wednesday, Thursday, Friday schedule. Part-time schedules are set for the full year and may be changed on an annual basis or if we have flexibility in our program to accommodate a secondary schedule.