Wethersfield Cooperative Nursery School

 

Our Teacher for both the three year old program and the four year old program is Corrie Coltey. Corrie holds a Bachelor's degree in Child Study from Saint Joseph College in West Hartford.  She also holds a State Head Teacher certificate with a 3-5 year old endorsement.  Corrie has over eight years experience in the early childhood field. Her teaching philosophy includes learning through play and social modeling.  Corrie believes that young children learn valuable life skills through daily play.  In her view, a young child's work is their play.  With this in mind, Corrie includes a variety of structured and unstructured play opportunities in the programs with intentional developmental goals.  Another aspect of Corrie's teaching philosophy is social modeling. This is a technique where the Teacher assists children in navigating through specific social situations that arise in a group setting, such as a disagreement over a toy.  Corrie believes this type of social intervention is most effective because it helps the young child acquire and utilize their skills in actual situations as they occur. 

Corrie is also familiar with the parental side of the cooperative nursery school model.  She enjoyed being a coop parent in another preschool where her daughter was enrolled.  Corrie feels that the coop model provides a wonderful connection for the child between home and school and gives the parent many opportunities to be involved during their child's first school experiences.           

Outside of the classroom, Corrie enjoys spending her time with her husband, daughter and German Shepherds.  She also enjoys scrapbooking, cooking and boating on the Connecticut River.