Hi Hello Child Care Center returns to Freeport

A home away from home for young children

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“A mind is a terrible thing to waste,” The Reverend Regina V, Johnson, Executive Director of the Hi-Hello Child Care Center said. It is a bright fall morning and the voices of happy children float down the hallway into the center’s office. Johnson, the founding minister of the Deeper Life Fellowship in Freeport, speaks about her vision for the Hi-Hello Child Care Center. “We care for the total child – emotionally, physically and academically,” she said. “We hope to shape and mold the lives of children so that they may fulfill their potential. We work with parents to help them achieve this; we minister to the family.”


Jannie West Mays, Director of Infant Care, nods. “If a problem extends beyond what we do here – homelessness or a lack of food, for example – we are prepared to help out.” Mays said. Like Johnson, Mays is an Assistant Pastor at St. John’s Church in Westbury and uses her educational background and her pastoral background to ensure that children are given the skills they need to build their lives.


The center will also work with children who have special needs and will make arrangements to have speech and occupational services at the site. “We welcome all children – of every race, creed and color,” Johnson said.


Hi-Hello Child Care located on South Ocean Avenue is a familiar Freeport institution. It opened in 1968 as a not for profit childcare center for 12 preschool children. By 1970 the center had an all day kindergarten for working parents; in 1972 the toddler program began. Programs for elementary school age children began in 1973 and by 1975 there was an infant nursery center for children from the age of 12 months.  In 1992 all of Hi-Hello’s program and services moved to the Center’s own facilities at 212 and 134 South Ocean Avenue and provided infant/toddler care; pre-school programs, after-school programs and summer camp programs for working parents. Hi-Hello Child Care closed in 2014 after 46 years of service.


Then in November of 2015, the Deeper Life Fellowship bought the two buildings on South Ocean Avenue with the intention of opening the childcare center again. “It’s just what we had hoped for,” Johnson said.


Hi-Hello opened its doors on Sept. 6 and has 17 children between six weeks and four years at its center at 212 South Ocean Avenue. There are six classrooms housing the infant/toddler development center and a preschool program for the 4- year olds.


Infants, from six weeks up to the age of 18 months are engaged in infant play. ”There is the playing of music and hand games for motor skills,” Mays said. “We engage minds and bodies.”


Toddlers between age two and three, and Pre-K students are in separate classrooms where more age appropriate activities occur. 


“Language begins in infancy,” Susan Stein, a 30-year veteran at Hi-Hello and now the lead teacher said.  “So you must speak constantly to them and sing.” As children mature they are provided with more formal learning that fosters social growth, verbal development and motor and intellectual skills using a variety of creative activities. For example, each week the classroom teacher will send home a poem to be read by the parents to their child to encourage language development and phonics.


Ninety percent of brain development occurs from birth through five years of age when a child’s brain develops 700 synapses- neural connections that support learning and skills – every second, according to the Child Care Council of Suffolk. “This is the time to develop a child’s thinking and encourage problem solving,” Johnson said. For example, Stein will use Popsicle sticks to encourage children to build things. “Be creative,” Stein said.


“Technology is good for older children, but the little ones must learn to use their minds,” Johnson said. “And hold onto reading; it’s the heartbeat of education.”
This month Hi-Hello opened its after school program for grades one through six, where children may participate in technology programs, group sports and games, technology programs, arts and crafts, music and drama, snack and homework time until their working parents pick them up.


Hi-Hello is open Monday through Friday, from 7:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. The facility is licensed by New York State and accredited by the National Academy of Early Childhood Programs.  For more information call 516-397-1825.


“We are baby friendly,” Johnson said. “We understand a parent’s concern about child care. But there is a lot of love here.”