On Tuesday, the North Bellmore School District hosted a meeting at Newbridge Road Elementary School for parents of incoming kindergartners.
Nearly 50 families in attendance learned how to prepare their children for kindergarten and understand what their children will be learning in their first year in elementary school.
"Making a connection between home and the school is a huge goal," said Superintendent Arnold Goldstein. He added that much can be done at home to enhance their experience once in school.
To begin, Linda Nussbaum, an occupational therapist at Newbridge, Martin Avenue and Dinkelmeyer, demonstrated the refinement of fine motor skills of kindergartners. She handed out scissors and coloring activities for the parents to give to their children, to establish smaller movements and muscles that come with the motor skills.
Park Avenue kindergarten teacher Ms. Robin Obey added that parents shouldn't worry about their children not being up to par with the skills of their friends, it mostly evens out eventually.
Obey then discussed how she wants every parent to "take every outing as a learning experience." She said children need to learn language, vocabulary and cognitive skills through telling stories, finding independence in the jobs they can have around the house, and reading.
"I cannot over emphasize enough that unstructured, child initiated play gives the best development," Obey said.
School librarian Phyllis Squicciarini and Jane Sullivan, a librarian at the North Bellmore Public Library, work together in the Summer Reading Program.
"Librarians are the gatekeepers of information," Squicciarini said.
The librarians of the districts are meant to give the students an opportunity to know their resources and help them know, no matter their age, what is a good for them to read.
At the end of the meeting, ESL teacher Randee Colter, who was representing the North Bellmore Teacher's Association, handed out the book "The Kissing Hand," by Audrey Penn, to parents as an opportunity to interact with their children and make an effort to utilize what the administrators taught during the meeting.
No comments:
Post a Comment