In Pre-School we have had a very busy couple of months.  In January we learned all about Winter and how to make a snowman.  We made snowmen for snack with pretzel sticks, marshmallows, and tubes of icing to make the faces and buttons.  In February we learned all about real and make believe bears.  We compared real and make believe books about bears and discussed why each story was real or make believe.  We even went on a bear hunt!  Don't worry, the bear we found was only make believe.   Come check out our Bear Cave in the gym!   We had a great Valentine's Party!  Thank you to the parents who came to help and sent treats.  Now, here we are in March.  We started the month celebrating Dr. Seuss's 106th Birthday!  We had fun reading Dr. Seuss books and making the cat in the hat to hang up in the gym.  On Friday this week we cooked green eggs and ham!  We thought it sounded nasty, but some of our friends ate 3 bowls of it!  It was really good! 

The year is coming to a close already!  We are working on the skills we will need to start Kindergarten.  As I am assessing alphabet letter and sound recognition, I am amazed at how far some of our pre-schoolers have come since the beginning of school.  Thank you to the parents who have taken the time at home to practice these skills with your child.  It is so important that they enter Kindergarten with a strong understanding of letter names and sounds. 

Mrs. Wood

At - Risk 4 year old Pre-School Teacher

The Legislative Post Audit report about school consolidation gave two plans, one plan put together any schools with less than 400 students and less than 200 square miles in their district, this would only save $18 million dollars.  The plan that would save more would make every school district in the state have at least 1600 students in the district, this plan would save much more around $128 million.  Let's examine it a little closer.

What business is our business in education:  Student Learning.  With the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation we are evaluated by our Annual Yearly Progress (AYP) and this is evaluated by our scores on the state assessments.  The AYP goes up yearly to insure schools are making honest efforts in regard to student learning.

Since the legislature thinks we all should have 1600 students, and there were 34 districts that did not make AYP lets see how those districts compare with smaller districts:  In class 6A there are 15 school districts making up the 32 schools, 7 of the 15 did not make AYP,              Class 5A there are 20 districts and 4 did not make AYP, 4A 12 of the 59 districts did not make AYP, 3A 4 of the 57 districts did not make AYP, and 2A-1A 4 out of 157 districts did not make AYP.  So of the districts that did not make AYP 88% of them are in 4A-5A-6A.

When you break it down by individual schools, there were 172 that did not make AYP last year and 146 of them came from districts with 1600 or more students.  That figures out to be 85%.  Maybe our leaders in Topeka need to look at making schools smaller not larger to have better student learning.

The March 2010 issue of the Blu Print can be found below by clicking the links provided.

To view the February 2010 Blu Print inside the school district, click here.

Patrons outside the school district should click here.

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