About Us

Welcome to Gateway to Early Learning! By enrolling your child in our program, you are giving your child a jump start to a positive educational career. 

Preschool is not mandated by the State of Montana, while you do not need to enroll your child in an early learning program, doing so will only set your child up with tools to be successful throughout the entirety of their learning journey. Our staff is made up of Educational Professionals, who take the learning and development of children seriously. Here, your child will have access to early intervention services, close observation, intentional practice, and the gift of key skills that will be needed as they enter Kindergarten. 

Our program is housed within the Columbia Falls Kids Foundation Building founded by Don Bennett, President of Freedom Bank. This location allows us to provide inclusive care to the entire community of Columbia Falls and beyond. Conveniently located upstairs is the Boys and Girls Club of Glacier Country, offering after school services and a summer program for older children.    

Gateway to Early Learning accepts subsidy programs such as Best Beginnings, if you feel you may qualify for a subsidy program to help cover tuition costs please discuss with one of your lead teachers and they will get you on the right track. Our staff is also happy to schedule times to assist with filling out these government forms to ensure you have the best opportunity possible to receive assistance if it is possible. 

Our program is entirely Family Funded, we are not a government or state program. Our day to day runs entirely off of tuition. Please keep this in mind when receiving your statements. Without timely payment, our program cannot remain open. 

This small center program has various curriculum programs ingrained within the framework, providing a well rounded and productive educational experience to your child. No matter what your child’s age. Our curriculums are as follows:

• Second Step

• Frog Street Pre-K & Frog Street Toddler & Frog Street Infant

• Handwriting Without Tears

• Conscious Discipline

With these four programs, we can effectively provide key social emotional skills, regulation skills, fine motor skills, language, mathematics, science, and comprehension skills. All of these elements will give each child a specific learning path to follow. These skills will follow them until they graduate! Your lead teachers hold educational degrees and expertise in Early Childhood Education. As the years progress with your family engaged and a part of our School Family, you will find yourself having open conversations regarding your individual child’s development, progress, and areas of need, these dialogues are key for your child’s teacher’s to implement the most meaningful and effective practices to give your child the best opportunity. Please remember to always take initiative with your child’s education in our program.

While this may all sound like your child will be doing a lot of paperwork, that is not the case. We have fine tuned these curriculum programs to work for us in a manner that allows your child to spend a vast portion of their day PLAYING! Play, engagement, conversation and experiences will be what provides your young learners with beneficial social interactions. Young children learn with their hands, voices, and eyes. We provide these opportunities throughout the entire day.  

During a typical day, your child will go outside, participate in centers, circle activities, meals, music and movement, and opportunities to go outside of their individual comfort zone.

We encourage you to take leadership over your students' learning experience. If you find an area that you feel should take more priority over others, please inform your lead teacher so that we can follow your instruction and implement additional support. We are more than happy to ensure you are seeing the progress needed for your individual child throughout their time with us. 

Welcome to the Gateway to Early Learning School Family! We look forward to a positive partnership with all of our families.