Preschool Screenings

Frequently Asked Questions:

·        How and when do I sign up my child for a screening?

Parents should call the school for a screening when their child turns 3 years old. Please call Elaine Johnson at 642-7593 to schedule an appointment.

·        When do screenings take place?

Screenings are scheduled 3 to 4 times a year usually one in the Fall, Winter, and Spring.

·        What can my child expect during a screening?

Approximately 6 children will come in for an hour session.  Children will rotate between adults doing various assessments based on developmental skills for their chronological age.  The areas that are observed are: fine motor, large motor, speech and language, social interaction, and cognition.

·        When do I find out the results?

After the screenings are scored by the team, you will receive either a letter or phone call explaining the results.  Based upon the results, your child may fall into one of these categories:

§         Your child may benefit from the program based upon developmental needs thus they will be enrolled.

§         Your child may have passed most areas, however would benefit from home activities due to lack of experience. These activities will be mailed to you. Then your child will be eligible for a re-screening 3-6 months later.  If you are still interested, please call to schedule a re-screening.

§         Your child passed all areas and would be considered a peer model for a future date.

·        What is a peer model?

A peer model is a 4 year old child who demonstrates independence.  Children are expected to be able to express themselves verbally, play cooperatively, toilet and dress themselves, follow simple directions, and behave appropriately.

·        How is the preschool program designed?

Lebanon Elementary School does not follow a traditional pre-kindergarten curriculum, but provides a pre-school program with a mix of special needs and typically developing students.  Our goal is to provide a balanced program in which each session contains a similar number of special needs and “peer model” students. Special needs students will continue to be a mix of three and four year olds.  However, the peer model students must be four years old by December 31 in order to be eligible.

·        What happens if my child turns five by December 31?

According to Connecticut State policy, your child will be expected to go on to Kindergarten.

·        How does my child become eligible to be a peer model?

Once your child has passed the preschool screening, they are placed into a lottery.  Reminder: your child must be 4 years old to qualify. If chosen, you will be notified and sent enrollment forms.  Your child will be assigned either the morning session or the afternoon session based upon available openings. The Am Session is Monday through Thursday from 8:20 to 11:15 , while the PM Session is Monday through Friday from12: 10 to 3:05 .

·        What happens if my child is three and passed the screening?

Your child will be put into the lottery for entrance into the program for the following year.  Your child does not need to be re-screened.

·        Is there a cost for the program?

 A fee will be charged only to the peer models.

In December Kindergarten classes have been focusing on the theme Animal Families. Some of our story titles for December are Does A Kangaroo Have a Mother, Too?, Are You There Baby Bear?, and A Time for Playing. We read decodable books each week that the children should reread frequently at home. To our high frequency word list we have added “have” and “you”. Encourage your child to locate these words in stories you read to them.   We continue to discuss rhyming words and word families. The children practice reading and writing simple three letter words with short a and short i in the middle. We have practiced the proper formation and sounds of the letters G, H and I. Reviewing letter sounds and letter formation at home with your child would be helpful. In math, we will be focusing on the numbers 6-10.  We will be counting objects, forming sets, and practicing correct number formation.  We will also be learning the number words six-ten, and reviewing the number words and formation of the numbers 0-5.

            December has been a busy month of learning for first grade.  We have read stories of both realistic fiction and non-fiction in our anthology. We have read about trying our best, even when we find it hard to do. We have learned that if we persevere, we can accomplish much more than we thought we could.   This story supports our character education theme that we encourage throughout the year.   We also read a non-fictional story, “Fun with Fish”, that taught us about the diversity of fish.  This story has supported our year long science theme of the diversity of animals and their habitats.   We have learned about different features of fish, camouflage and other means of protection used, and of the ocean habitat.   In some classes we have even created art projects that have transformed our classrooms into fish aquariums!

We have practiced the phonetic elements of –or, and sh in these stories. The comprehension skills of noting details and identifying characters while reading  were learned and practiced . These are important skills to help us comprehend the texts that we are reading.  We have focused on rereading and self-correcting when what we read does not make sense.   These are strategies that help us become skillful, independent readers.  We have practiced re-telling stories, from the beginning, middle, and end of the stories.  It is hard work to remember details and events in order as we re-tell the story. Sometimes we have used picture props to help us order and re-tell events.    We have learned that nouns name peoples, animals, and things in our grammar lessons.

In Writing we have been focusing on many new skills.  We are continuing to develop our skill of writing in complete sentences, with a subject, which is called the naming part and a verb, called the telling part.  We have been learning to use upper case letters at the beginning of sentences, and ending punctuation at the end of sentences. To help us try to spell words as correctly as possible we have continued to use the strategy of stretching out the sounds of the word. This is called “approximated spelling”.  For words that we have learned to spell correctly in spelling lessons, we have tried to spell correctly in our writing.   We have been learning to use details and description in our writing to make it more interesting. To help guide the reader to understand a sequence of events, we have also begun to write using transition words, such as first, then, later, and after.  We have written in our journals,  literature responses, and seasonal writings.

            In Social Studies we have explored some of the traditions and celebrations for December of  people throughout the world. We have learned that many cultures use light as a way to brighten this dark time near the winter solstice. Some classes have focused on different countries.  These are some of the places and traditions that some classes have studied and experienced.  Some have learned about St. Lucia Day in Sweden and have made stars for their traditional procession.  Other classes have “traveled” to Mexico to celebrate Las Posadas, making candle holders called  luminaries to lighten the  procession.  Other have read The Legend of the Poinsettia by Tomie dePaola which tells the Mexican legend of the origin of the poinsettia.  Then we created beautiful poinsettias of our own.

Some have journeyed to Germany and made gingerbread houses, after reading the story by Jan Brett, The Gingerbread Baby.   After looking very carefully to see the unique qualities of each house,  we wrote detailed descriptions of our houses.  Later we tried to match each description to the actual gingerbread house.  Classes  have also learned about the traditions of Hanukkah.  We have learned about the menorah which is lit for eight nights.   Some of us played the dreidel game and ate latkes and applesauce. 

We have enjoyed reading many pieces of children’s literature as we explore this season. We have found that books can let us travel to many parts of the world just by opening and reading them!    

Library Media Center

Many new ideas are happening during Library time.  The Lebanon Elementary School Library Media Center collection includes print and non-print material in a variety of formats.  The collection reflects the school’s collection as well as the recreational needs of the students.

Students visit the library once a week. All students are introduced to our automated card catalog.  Older students become familiar with the on-line Grolier and World Book Encyclopedia, along with Iconn.org (Connecticut Digital Library).

Students may sign-out fiction, nonfiction, classroom topics, Caldecott and Newberry Medal Award winning books , as well as free choice books.  Books are borrowed for one week and may be renewed.  No fines are charged for late books but damaged or lost books must be paid for before the student can resume library privileges.

Our goal is to encourage the love of books and reading, and to promote responsibility, respect and caring with every visit to the library and with every book borrowed.