Center strives to teach basic skills

Boys will be boys, especially when they're 4 and 5 years old.

It was hard to figure out what the four boys actually put together with their Space Links - a 21st century version of Tinker Toys or Legos. But the boys could tell.

Ray guns. Rocket ships. All parts of some space opera that only preschool kids could understand.

"Pkkewww. Pkkkeww. … Kitchakitchakitcha. … Oooooo, laser gun. … I'm a bad guy. … I'm a nice guy. … I'm Thunderbird."

Teacher Kathy Smith tried to nudge the boys toward something more uplifting with less imaginary gunplay.

She took some small plastic animal heads out of a box and encouraged the boys to create animal bodies with their Space Links.

Four-year-old Haidyn Covert took a small cat's head and attached it to his tiny homemade space ship.

He declared: "This is bad kitty. Bad kitties are trying to destroy the world."

The rest of the class at the Discovery Developmental Center was a bit more down to earth.

Smith and Becky Madison played with and taught roughly a dozen 4- and 5-year-olds Thursday morning while teaching subtle lessons spread among the fun and games.

The activities include building things with big red blocks, listening to storybooks on tape, painting with watercolors, working in a tot-sized kitchen, and playing in the "tactile tub," which could be filled with sand one week or popcorn or wood shavings the next week.

While the private, nonprofit Discovery Developmental Center has been in Kalispell since 1992, it moved into its newly constructed present building at 75 Glenwood Drive on Aug. 1. The center led a nomadic existence since spring 2004 when the owner of its Meridian Road location sold that property.

The center serves 82 children, ages 2 through 5, at different times in three class levels as a mix of day care and kindergarten preparation.

The oldest children go to public-school kindergarten in the morning, with the center providing supplementary classes in the afternoon. The daily capacity is 45 children at a time and the center usually reaches that limit.

On the surface, class sessions are supervised play periods. However, the center's nine employees mingle with the kids to teach them skills needed in kindergarten.

Those skills includ learning to share. How to stand in line. When to be quiet as group. How to deal with kids outside of their families.

"Kids are not born with these skills. They don't learn them through osmosis, but have to be directly taught those skills," said Collette Box, the center's director.

Different ages routinely mix and play together at the center, which tries to maintain a family-like environment.

"We found that the older kids like hanging out with the younger kids," Box said. "They feel like helpers."

The center's staff and children adjusted quickly to the new building with no significant problems.

Meanwhile, the center's board is pondering whether to put in another addition just north of the current building, but is waiting until a budget, funds and other projections are nailed down.

Reporter John Stang may be reached at 758-4429 or by e-mail at jstang@dailyinterlake.com