Appleseeds Day School

Appleseeds is the only early childhood program accredited by NAEYC in Exeter, NH. We are one of eight accredited schools in Rockingham County. We provide high quality early childhood education and care while maintaining school hours of 6:30-5:30 (with an open door policy), to accommodate families busy schedules. Our educational programs for infants, toddlers, preschoolers and kindergartners are based upon NAEYC's best practices and are aligned with NH Department of Education’s Early Learning Standards. Our preschool students transition to kindergarten with the foundation they need for their academic success, some as early readers. Approximately 95% of our kindergartners leave our program as successful early readers. We track each child's developmental progress by building individualized portfolios over the course of the year, infants through kindergarten. The portfolios contain samples of the child's work, documentation of developmental accomplishments, photographs, and documentation of curriculum explaining the goals and objectives of the activities with the child's participation in it. These portfolios create a story of the child's experience in the classroom and validate the child's work within the classroom.

Appleseeds successfully provides nurturing and safe environments for all of our students while focusing on building long lasting trusting relationships with each student and their family. The children only transition once a year to their next classroom in large groups so they are able to maintain established friendships and have a sense of security as they move on to their next classroom. We pride ourselves in the longevity of our teachers. 30% of our teachers have been teaching at Appleseeds for over 10 years and 69% of our teachers have been teaching at Appleseeds for over 5 years. Because of the longevity of our teachers, students and their families have a sense of comfort and security as they transition to the next classroom. Children will often bring their work to their past teachers to show their accomplishments to them. There is a true sense of community as you enter the school. Families get to know one another and develop friendships outside of school. The relationships developed between teachers and families last through the years as well. We often hear how unique Appleseeds is when it comes to the atmosphere at our school and sense of community and partnership.

Appleseeds has been featured in several articles in the local newspapers for work on giving back to the community. This includes the in-school lemonade stand our preschoolers hosted for NHSPCA, the collection for the Ladies of Liberty that our kindergarten class organized and our annual drives for the NH Foodbank and WIC. We are always providing opportunities for students to learn about good citizenship and caring for the community.