Graduation Day for Children and Mt. Kisco Daycare, Preschool

It’s the time of year for kids of all ages to graduate.

Some will be changing classrooms, others moving on to new schools, while the oldest will say goodbye to childhood friends off to college. It happens every year.

One commencement is a little unique as The Kids World Daycare is graduating to preschool status.

Similar to a high school senior, this graduation was more than 15 years in the making. Founded in Mount Kisco in 1997 by Aleida Vitolo and her mother, Fidelina Orellana, The Kids World Daycare originally opened with just two children.

In the fall, when the new preschool officially opens at 236 S. Bedford Rd., it will not only feature a new name, A Kids World Bilingual Preschool and Daycare, but also hold a license for up to 20 children fulltime from two to five years old plus four part-time afterschool kids up to nine years old.

Similar to that graduating high school senior moving on to college, The Kids World is expanding the daycare out of Orellana’s house on Lawrence Street.

“The daycare started as an opportunity to earn income out of our home while raising a family, but it quickly became a passion to educate as many children as I can help,” Vitolo said.

Retiring from a position with a consultants agency in White Plains in 1996, Vitolo took early childhood education classes and earned a license from the Childcare Council of Westchester. The original license was for up to six children fulltime ranging from infants to four years old at the family’s home, then on Turner Lane. The Kids World moved into the location on Lawrence Street in 2000.

“The perfect age for learning things from a second language to how to play with others is two to five years old,” Vitolo said. “If I was sending my child to daycare, I would want a learning environment for them and the best way to provide that was to be in a larger space.”

Along with the move, the growing early child education center became licensed by the Office of Children and Family Services of New York for 12 kids ranging from infants to five years old in 2002. That limit was increased to 16 last year.

Stacy Cambareri, a mother of a five-year-old girl who has been attending The Kids World since she was three months old, believes the learning environment is the driving force behind the launch of the preschool.

“Sabrina learned so much more then I would ever be able to teach her, including how to count in both English and Spanish, her ABCs, her colors and not only her letters, but how to write her name,” Cambareri said.

While expanding her resources to educate children has long been Vitolo’s goal, it took the right opportunity–specifically location–to open the preschool.

“I’ve waited for a location surrounded by nature because it’s important for kids to spend time outside,” she said. “We can simply go out our door to learn about our surroundings, see birds and other animals or just get exercise.”

Retaining the original The Kids World on Lawrence Street to continue caring for infants to two-year olds, the launch of the preschool provides a hands-on educational environment that includes bilingual instruction.

“I love working with kids, teaching them, spending the day with them, just getting down on their level and understanding them,” Vitolo said.

While Cambareri’s daughter, Sabrina, is moving on to kindergarten in the fall, Cambareri said the school’s approach does more than help children learn the basics.

“It is like a family. In fact, Sabrina use to cry when I would come to pick her up because she didn’t want to come home with me yet,” she said.

Vitolo said the family atmosphere helps children transition to the next phase of their lives.

“I’ve always been proud of the children that left The Kids World with an understanding of a lot of things kids at that age don’t always grasp, which I think helps as they grow,” Vitolo said.

Two of those children who started at the original The Kids World in 1997, will be graduating high school soon. Their commencement marks the beginning of a long journey, just like the graduation from daycare to A Kids World Bilingual Preschool and Daycare is only the beginning of Vitolo’s expedition to educate children at an early age.

By Michael Hopkins