Mission:

Building Strong Foundations with Alaska Native Families through Alaska Native Cultures and Education

Vision:

Strong Native Children and Their Families Reaching Their Full Potential

Our program goals in working with our community are:

• Establish a supportive learning environment for children, parents, and staff. Value & promote the building of awareness, skills, & understanding.
  
• Recognize that the members of the Head Start community - children, families, & staff - have roots in many cultures. Work as a team and effectively promote respectful and proactive approaches to diversity.
  
• Families are empowered when families, governing bodies, & staff share the responsibility of program governance. Hear and respect the ideas and opinions of families.
  
• Embrace a comprehensive vision of health for children, families, & staff. Assure that basic health needs are met, encourage preventive health practices, and promote behaviors that enhance life-long well being.
  
• Respect the importance of all aspects of individual development, including social, emotional, cognitive, & physical growth.
  
• Build a community in which each child & adult is respected as an individual while still belonging to the group.
  
• Foster relationships with the larger community to build a network of partners that respects families and staff.
  
• Develop a continuum of care, education and services that allows stable, uninterrupted support to children & families before, during & after their Head Start experience.

--Source: Head Start Performance Standards; 45CFR, Introduction, page 1.

About The School:

At Cook Inlet Native Head Start (CINHS), we use "the Way We See" curriculum. "The Way We See" curriculum is a systematic guide of planned activities designed to build experiences, skills, and attitudes that prepare each child for kindergarten. The Curriculum is researched-Based*. rubric driven, observation assessed, and draws upon learning and child development principles that are delivered through the utilization and focus upon Alaska Native values and cultural enrichment.** The curriculum is administered in a child-centered environment which is play-based and stressed the development of social, emotional, motor, physical, and cognitive skills.

* Research Sources: Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework: Ages Birth to Five; the Alaskan State Early Learning Guides; and National "Best Practices" research studies on early childhood learning with a focus on pre-kindergarten learning: social/emotional development, language development, cognitive development, and motor and physical development.

** Values and Cultural Sources: Alaska Native Values for Curriculum; Alaska Native Seasonal Cycles: A Cultural Curriculum Framework; and early childhood learning and education research on Alaska Natives and American Indians.