Kindergarten

 

Entering Kindergarten is an exciting milestone in your child’s life. Our Lady of the Lake Catholic School provides a safe, supportive, and nurturing environment while fostering the development of the whole child and a commitment to faith and academic excellence. From the moment they walk through the door, our kindergarteners feel at home. 

Curriculum

Reading 

Focus: We focus on letter sounds, progressing from sounds to CVC, CVCC, to CCVC words. We also learn sight words. SuperKids is a reading, writing, and phonics curriculum, helping students to build their knowledge through: books, songs, games, and workbooks.
 
Textbook: SuperKids, Heggerty Phonemic Awareness
 
 

Writing 

Focus: We focus on using lines to help us form both uppercase and lowercase letters. Each SuperKids unit includes writing prompts, booklets, and handwriting paper to help students get their stories on paper.
 
Textbook: SuperKids
 

Math 

Focus: We use the Eureka Math curriculum to sharpen our skills with shapes, number recognition, comparison of lengths, addition and subtraction to 10, and counting. 
 
Textbook: Eureka Math
 

Science 

Focus: We gain a better understanding of: animal needs, plant needs, severe weather, weather patterns, sunlight and warmth, and pushes and pulls. All our units include hands-on activities. We also encourage scientific curiosity using mini-lessons to answer questions like: why do we have leap year? and why do whales sing? In the fall we study the life cycle of pumpkins and take a field trip to the pumpkin patch!
 
Curriculum: Mystery Science
 

Social Studies 

Focus: We have five Social Studies Units: Citizenship, Then and Now, Holidays Around the World, My Community, and Our World. In each unit, students use a workbook to show their understanding. Students learn using books, videos, games, and drawings to emerse themselves into each unit.
 

Religion 

Focus: We begin our religious studies focusing on how to treat others with kindness, as we are all made in the image of God. In November Kindergarteners will do a Saint project and present their Saint to the class. We also focus on Mary and the Liturgical seasons.
 
Textbook: God Loves Us
 

Social/Emotional Skills 

Focus: We focus on having a growth mindset, kindness, respect, and problem solving. October is National Bullying Prevention Month. During this month we have a lesson every week focusing on recognizing, refusing, reporting, and bystander power. 
 
Textbook: Second Step
 

Service and Leadership

During the season of Lent, Kindergartner’s are asked to do acts of service at home to earn quarters. These quarters are then donated to the Heifer International to help buy a goat to support a family in need. Student’s learn all about goats and how they support families across the world.
 

Enrichment

To enrich learning and the kindergarten experience we buddy up with the 5th grade for reading buddies once a week. We also have a student led math portion each day called Number Corner from the Bridges in Mathematics Curriculum. To acknowledge and showcase each student we have a Star Student writing unit.  We also do a weekly show and tell for students to practice speaking in front of their peers and use full sentences. 
 

Special Events

We have lots of exciting events, such as: Very Important Person week (each student is the VIP for the week), Welcome night in May for the incoming class, 100 days of school celebration, a Pete the Cat scavenger hunt, and the Kindergarten/8th grade Kickball game.

"There will be times when you walk into a room and no one there is quite like you... until the day you begin to share your stories. And all at once, in the room where no one else is quite like you, the world opens itself up a little wider to make some space for you."

- Jacqueline Woodson

 

I was born and raised in the Seattle area, attending Holy Rosary West Seattle before venturing off to Kennedy Catholic High School. I graduated from Gonzaga University in 2020 with a Bachelors of Arts and Sciences in Psychology and my elementary teaching certificate. I began teaching Kindergarten at OLL in 2021.