Nuts and Bolts for Transitional Kindergarten: Preparing Our Youngest Students to Succeed in Kindergarten

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Nuts and Bolts for Transitional
KindergartenPreparing Our Youngest Students
toSucceed in Kindergarten

• Washington School
• Kingsburg Elementary Charter School District
• Mrs. Ying Lee- Transitional Kindergarten Teacher
• Mrs. Shirley Esau, Principal and Director of
  Categorical Programs

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Inspiration the youngest kindergarten students
and a pioneering teacher
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Kingsburg

• Kingsburg -12,000 people, located between Fresno
  and Visalia.
• Kingsburg Elementary Charter School District
  serves all the students in town preschool
  through 8th grade.
• Largest Charter District in California
• ADA 2500
• High student achievement District API 816
• Transitional kindergarten students ride the bus
  just like kindergarten students.

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Kingsburg Elementary Charter School District

• Washington School preschool kindergarten
  Title 1 Schoolwide
• Early Intervention preschool ( 30 students)
• State preschool (90 students)
• Transitional kindergarten (25 students)
• Kindergarten (243 students).
• Roosevelt School - first grade
• Lincoln School second and third grades
• Reagan Elementary fourth, fifth, sixth grades
• Rafer Johnson Junior High seventh eighth
  grades
• Central Valley Home School K-8 grades
• Island Community Day School 4-8 grades

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Kindergarten Readiness Act of 2010 SB 1381

• The legislation SB 1381 creates transitional
  kindergarten, the first year of a two-year
  kindergarten experience for those students who
  are born between September and December. These
  children would have been in kindergarten if the
  law had not changed.
• Transitional kindergarten is proactive instead of
  retention being reactive. Both cases require the
  Continuance Form for each child and both are two
  year programs by default.

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Kingsburgs Action Plan 2009-11

• Preschool to kindergarten Articulation plan with
  all public and private preschools. (2 year
  project completed 2009-10)
• Pre-K assessment designed and given by preschools
  ( 2010-11)
• Registration was completed via preschools
  (2010-11)
• Partnership with FCOE, and Packard Foundation
  (2010-11)
• Funding ADA, Packard Grant, ARRA funds, Title
  1(2010-11)

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Kingsburgs Action Plan 2009-11

• Use a current kindergarten classroom and
  recruited a current highly qualified KES
  kindergarten teacher with a child development
  background and high expectations to start the
  transitional kindergarten class. This saved a
  kindergarten teachers position and kept a
  classroom full of students that would have been
  lost with the date change. (2010-11)

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Action Plan 2010-11

• As registrations came in for kindergarten,
  selected students with Sept.1 - Dec. 2 birthdays.
  .
• Mailed parents informational about Transitional
  kindergarten and a registration request.
• 25 students in class
• Sub-groups in Transitional kindergarten class
  include
• 3 Special Needs students,
• 6 English Language Learners,
• 15 Socio-Economic Disadvantaged students.

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Pre-K Assessment given to all entering
kindergarten Students
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Placement Criteria

• Birth date Priority to Sept-Dec.
• Pre-K Assessment
• DIBLES to confirm placement and provide guidance
  for interventions
• Conclusion based on data
• The correct students are in the Transitional
  kindergarten class. They need the gift of time
  to master the standards and have a bridge to
  future success academically, socially, and
  developmentally.

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Standards Alignment and Pacing Guide

• Blending of Preschool Foundations and
  Kindergarten Standards
• Pacing guide for ELA and Math
• Assessments

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Curriculum differences between Traditional and
Transitional kindergarten at Washington School,
Kingsburg
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Focus

• Phonemic awareness
• Letter names and sounds
• Motor skills
• Handwriting
• Writing
• Oral language
• Listening skills
• Early number sense
• Social/emotional development

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Daily Schedule

• School Begins 810
• Language Arts
• Carpet Time 815 850
• Rotations 850 950
• Recess 950 1005
• Calendar 1010 1020
• PALS 1020 1035
• Math 1035 1100
• Lunch 1100 1120
• Math 1120 1155
• Recess 1155 1225
• Intervention 1230 100
• Writing/Social Studies/ 100 125
• Science
• Closing 125 140
• Dismissal 150

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Instructional Strategies

• Kinesthetic activities
• - physical phonics
• - tapping out sounds
• - I Can Spell mat
• Learning through music/songs
• - rhyming rhythm
• - Greg and Steve Listen and Move used for
  teaching action words
• - using musical terms to teach reading
• Puppets
• - phonemic awareness
• - story telling (literature, math)

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Instructional Strategies

• Hands on
• - Elkonin boxes
• - Handwriting Without Tears
• - Touch Math
• - AIMS
• Realia
• - vocabulary building
• - oral language
• - phonemic awareness

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Centers

• Science making and recording observations
• ABC center
• Listening center
• Math center
• Puppet/Dramatic Play
• Word work
• Computer
• These provide more exploration and bring a
  balance between teacher directed and child
  directed learning.

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Challenges

• Selecting curriculum, blending preschool
  foundations and standards with kindergarten
  standards to make a developmentally appropriate
  program. Choosing the kindergarten standards that
  were essential to be mastered in TK.
• Communicating clearly to the community how SB
  1381 provides for Transitional kindergarten and
  its benefits for students.

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Successes

• Selecting a qualified teacher willing to be a
  pioneer with high expectations, but mindful of
  child development pedagogy.
• Parent support, involvement, approval, and
  advocacy.
• Students achieving socially, physically,
  cognitively and excited about attending school.

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Success The gift of time SB 1381

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Kingsburg Elementary Charter School District
Website

• www.kingsburg-elem.k12.ca.us
• Washington School
• Transitional Kindergarten
• Email sesau_at_kingsburg-elem.k12.ca.us
• Email ylee_at_kingsburg-elem.k12.ca.us
• Phone [phone]