Bucktown Academy

Becky Gonzalez was the preschool teacher for both of my children. I pulled my older son from a fancy private preschool to put him in her class and was extremely surprised and pleased with how much he learned under Ms. Gonzalez’s tutelage.
I cannot imagine a better learning environment for a child entering school than the classroom of Ms. Gonzalez. It’s warm and inviting and filled with interesting, educational activities for children.
Ms. Gonzalez has incredible relationships with both parents and students. She is kind but firm, challenging but patient, and manages to be entirely empathetic while maintaining complete professionalism.
Ms. Gonzalez is extremely knowledgeable regarding innovative, progressive teaching methods and practices and was the first teacher to introduce the Responsive Classroom approach to me. This method helps foster a feeling of camaraderie and instills a sense of respect for one another among the students in her classroom. She is also Nationally Board Certified, which is highly unusual among most preschool teachers.
Ms. Gonzalez is passionate in her commitment to teaching and does an excellent job of differentiating her teaching by maximizing her brightest students’ performance while helping struggling students through individual attention, kindness and support. She always keeps her students’ parents informed of what and how their children are doing in school so that we can also work with our children at home.
I highly recommend you send your children to Bucktown Academy.

I am so thankful to have had Ms. Gonzalez as my children’s first teacher! When your child «leaves» home for the first time as a preschooler, you are entrusting not only his education to someone new, but their social and emotional growth as well. Both my children LOVED Ms. Gonzalez– and still talk about her to this day (they are now 10 and 7!) They are 2 very different learners– and she was able to see their unique styles and instill in them a love of learning all the while challenging them at their own level. She was so caring and nurturing and we left each morning drop off with full confidence that our kids would be in great hands. Ms. Gonzalez is a truly gifted educator– with experience, insight and understanding for not only the little ones (but also the parents!)
Every child should be so lucky to have such an amazing «first teacher» experience!

There are so many pre-​k options for children in the city that it can be overwhelming and a bit scary to start the research to chose one. The team at Bucktown Academy alleviates all of the anxiety and gives both the children and the parents PERSONAL ATTENTION to maximize the children’s positive experience and learning. My 3 yr old son did not have a scheduled life (we had a full time nanny) prior to school here and they did a wonderful job working with him. I have a load of respect and a lot less worry in thinking about his next steps in school after Bucktown Academy — but thankfully we have another year there!

This review is meant for the owner and teacher, Ms. Gonzalez. Although my children did not attend Bucktown Academy, they both had the pleasure of having Ms. Gonzalez at her former school Burr (CPS in Bucktown) which we worked hard to get in to as her reputation has spread throughout the area.
We feel so lucky that both of our children got to enjoy having Ms. Gonzalez as their first introduction into school and formal learning. Her learning methods, positive and fun-​loving attitude, and differentiation in the classroom led to the perfect launching pad into Kindergarten. Both kids left PreK loving school and flourishing in academics. One of our children even tested and placed into a CPS Classical Gifted program.
Although Ms. Gonzalez infuses play based learning in her curriculum, the focus is very much academic and all kids leaving her programs are ahead of the game once they start school. I highly recommend Ms. Gonzalez and her program to anyone in the area who values education. We feel as though we hit the jackpot in Prek teachers!

I can’t say enough positive things about Bucktown Academy and more importantly it’s owner and teacher Ms Gonzalez. Half the reason we haven’t left the city for better schools is that she has done an amazing job with our kids. Our 5 year old, who is no longer with her, spent 2 years being taught by her (when she was 3 and 4)
My wife and I couldn’t be more pleased with the outcome. Not only do we think she pushed our child, and help her to flourish (as a kindergartner she is reading chapter books and doing long addition and subtraction) but there were also many opportunities for us to come and help, volunteer, watch, or hang out with our child. After our 1^st daughter spent two years there, and went off to kindergarten at Burr (a CPS school) our next daughter started with her.
And in 2 more years we she moves on to CPS our son will absolutely go into her class.
I know, I know this sounds like a bogus review, but I am serious. I never met her before 2 years ago and now I think she is amazing. I dont know if in Unilocal you can email me, but If you can email my profile, I would be happy to discuss more. And if not, you will just have to trust me.
Definitely choose Bucktown Academy!