Welcome to Kindergarten

We believe every child is a reader and a writer. Our literacy program uses systematic instruction to build strong foundations (phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension) while helping to build a love of reading and writing. 

• Personalized Growth: Through a mix of mini-lessons, small group instruction and one-on-one conferences, we know our learners well and respond to their needs.
• Bridge to Independence: Students practice skills during independent reading and writing time, while teacher led read alouds, shared reading and writing experiences immerse them in the magic of stories.
• Our Goal: To give students the tools to decode and encode the world around them while establishing their unique identities as storytellers, while instilling a sense of joy around reading and writing.

In the School District of Clayton, we believe math should be sensible, approachable, and fun. Our curriculum focuses on three essential questions that help children make sense of the world around them in order to understand the purpose of math in our lives:

1. Describing Our World: How can we use numbers to describe and compare amounts?
2. Communicating Change: How do we model joining sets together or taking them away?
3. Geometric Exploration: How do shapes—from simple circles to complex spheres—describe the world around us?

Our Approach: Students move from hands-on objects to solving equations (like 5 + 2 = 7) to ensure they are creative, strategic thinkers.

Through our partnership with mySci from Washington University in St. Louis, our students engage in hands-on, inquiry-based learning. Your child will learn to think like a scientist through three exciting units:

• Sun and Shade: Designing devices to stay cool on the playground.
• Make it Go: Exploring the physics of "pushes and pulls" through toy design.
• Life in the Rainforest: Understanding the needs of plants and animals.

Our curriculum is grounded in creating strong communities where everyone has a strong sense of belonging. 

• Global Citizens: We celebrate the diversity of our community by exploring global traditions, including Lunar New Year, Diwali, Ramadan, and Day of the Dead.
• Empathy & Awareness: By celebrating each child's individual culture and history, we help them understand their place in their local and global communities.
• Our Classroom: We use daily school rules and procedures to teach the values of rights, responsibilities, and how to be a contributing member of a community.

• Morning meeting - a time to come together as a community of learners and check in as a group
• Literacy and Social Studies - a time to continue to build community through reading, writing and learning about our culture and exploring the cultures of others
• Morning recess - a time to practice our social emotional learning through engaged play with peers
• Math - a time to build our numeracy skills and learn through the use of manipulatives, conversations and collaboration to make sense of numbers and how they relate to the world around us
• Specials 
  • PE - every day, children practice collaboration in team and group activities
  • Art- twice a week, children practice honing their creative skills while learning to interact in the different studios in the art room
  • Music - three times a week, children participate in a general music class where the focus is on connecting personal experiences, knowledge, and cultural contexts to the creative processes within music
  • Library - a time to engage with a read aloud with the librarian and make choices through library book check-out
• Lunch and afternoon recess - a time to again practice social emotional learning through engaged play with peers and through community building in the cafeteria 
• Science - a time to explore the world around us and begin to learn one of our science enduring understandings:  all things in nature are made up of interacting and interdependent parts.  Everything is a part in a larger system
• Dismissal - a time to reconnect with family and share learning from the day