Kindergarten Lead Teacher

Dream Preparatory Academy, INC; Greenville (SC); On-site; USD 42,000 - 64,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Comprehensive benefits package

Job summary

Dream Preparatory Academy, located in Greenville, SC, seeks a Kindergarten Lead Teacher to bridge early discovery with structured primary education and lead as instructional leader for our youngest learners.

You will balance foundational academic readiness with social-emotional development, guiding standards-based instruction and family engagement to prepare students for a confident transition to First Grade.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Early Childhood Education or related field.
• At least 1 year of experience with children ages 4–6; student teaching or residency counts for entry-level candidates.
• Ability to differentiate content and accommodate IEP/504 plans; collaborate with SPED/speech providers.

Responsibilities

• Lead curriculum alignment to SC standards across ELA, Math, Science, and Social Studies.
• Document and assess standards-based progress; plan horizontally and vertically.
• Deliver explicit foundational literacy instruction and phonemic awareness.
• Implement early numeracy concepts using concrete manipulatives.
• Supervise and support Kindergarten Assistant Teacher and classroom routines.
• Build family partnerships and communicate progress toward First Grade readiness.

Skills

Curriculum planning

Differentiation

Family communication

Collaborative teamwork

Education

Bachelor's in Early Childhood Education or related field

Job description

About This Role

As the Kindergarten Lead Teacher, you are the crucial bridge between early childhood discovery and structured primary education. You serve as the instructional leader for our youngest learners, ensuring a safe, nurturing, standards-based, and developmentally appropriate environment. By balancing foundational academic readiness with crucial social-emotional and fine-motor development, you play a vital role in shaping a child’s first impression of formal schooling and preparing them for a confident transition into First Grade.

About This Role

As the Kindergarten Lead Teacher, you are the crucial bridge between early childhood discovery and structured primary education. You serve as the instructional leader for our youngest learners, ensuring a safe, nurturing, standards-based, and developmentally appropriate environment. By balancing foundational academic readiness with crucial social-emotional and fine-motor development, you play a vital role in shaping a child’s first impression of formal schooling and preparing them for a confident transition into First Grade.

What You'll Do

• Curriculum & Kindergarten Standards Alignment: Implement high-quality instruction using the approved Dreamers School of Excellence curriculum, explicitly mapping lessons to the South Carolina College- and Career-Ready Standards for Kindergarten in ELA, Mathematics, Science, and Social Studies, blended with school-adopted Montessori practical-life aims.
• Teachers are expected to explicitly identify standards in all lesson plans, translate standards into measurable learning objectives, maintain documented evidence that standards have been introduced, taught, practiced, assessed, retaught, and mastered, participate actively in horizontal and vertical planning, and continuously adjust instructional pacing based on student-performance data.
• Early Literacy & Phonemic Awareness Foundation: Deliver explicit, systematic instruction focused heavily on print concepts, phonological and phonemic awareness (isolating, blending, and segmenting sounds), alphabet recognition, and letter-sound correspondences, ensuring students build the core mechanics required to decode text confidently without guessing.
• Foundational Number Sense & Mathematical Logic: Implement South Carolina Kindergarten math standards with an intense focus on early numeracy—including counting to 100, cardinally, subitizing, writing numerals, comparing quantities, and understanding basic addition and subtraction concepts through extensive use of physical manipulatives and concrete objects.
• Motor, Sensory, & Executive-Functioning Integration: Design daily active-learning centers and routines that explicitly develop fine motor skills (pencil grip, scissor control), gross motor coordination, spatial awareness, and executive functioning tasks like following multi-step directions and organizing personal belongings.
• Social-Emotional & School-Readiness Coaching: Proactively teach foundational school-readiness behaviors, including emotional self-regulation, collaborative play, sharing, conflict resolution, and transition endurance, utilizing trauma-informed, non-shaming strategies that build a joyful, respectful classroom culture.
• Kindergarten Readiness Assessment & Tracking: Administer mandatory beginning-, middle-, and end-of-year readiness screeners alongside ongoing formative tracking of foundational standards to differentiate small-group interventions and measure clear readiness progress for First Grade.
• Instructional Team Supervision: Provide daily operational direction, collaborative lesson planning guidance, and meaningful classroom assignments to the Kindergarten Assistant Teacher, maximizing small-group learning rotations and ensuring coordinated student supervision.
• Family Partnership & Transition Collaboration: Partner closely with families to demystify the Kindergarten-to-First Grade transition, providing objective data, clear behavioral benchmarks, and practical home-learning strategies through scheduled conferences and regular progress updates.

Requirements

• Required Education: A bachelor's degree or higher from an accredited college or university, featuring a major, concentration, certification area, or substantial coursework in Early Childhood Education, Child Development, Montessori Education, or a related approved field.
• Experience: At least one year of successful experience working with children between ages four and six is preferred. Supervised student teaching, residency, or internship experience within a Kindergarten or Pre-K setting will be considered for entry-level candidates.
• Professional Competencies: Demonstrated ability to differentiate foundational content for wide ranges of early childhood readiness, implement documented IEP/504 accommodations, collaborate with speech and special education providers, and apply instructional coaching feedback.
• Communication: Excellent verbal and written communication skills for delivering prompt, empathetic, and clear notifications to families regarding student growth, academic benchmarks, and behavioral milestones.
• Essentials: Must pass all required criminal background checks, fingerprinting, child-abuse registry screenings, and reference verifications, while maintaining valid pediatric/adult CPR, First Aid, and AED certifications. Additionally, employees must complete mandatory child-safety training, state mandated-reporter training, emergency procedures orientation, adhere strictly to student confidentiality (FERPA) requirements, and satisfy all applicable state health requirements.

Nice To Haves

• Preferred Qualifications: Current South Carolina educator certification in Early Childhood Education; Master's degree; Montessori Early Childhood credential (AMS/AMI); specialized training in early literacy models (LETRS for Early Childhood, Orton-Gillingham); or experience with play-based or sensory-integrated inquiry models.

Benefits

• Professional Impact: The opportunity to shape the foundational academic and developmental experience for young learners in a premier educational setting.
• Professional Development: Access specialized school-assigned training pathways including South Carolina Kindergarten standards updates, Science of Reading, structured early literacy, Montessori-inspired practical-life practices, and early childhood behavior intervention.
• Total Rewards: Competitive salary commensurate with your experience, plus a comprehensive benefits package

About Us

Dream Preparatory Academy, located in Greenville, SC, is a unique educational organization that offers a new teaching style to break traditional barriers of learning repetitive lessons in a prepared routine environment. Our goal is to create a more interactive, hands-on learning environment that is technology-focused and can integrate classroom-to-home management.