Glenda Ritz, superintendent of public instruction, will be visiting two Evansville Vanderburgh School Corporation Schools Wednesday morning to learn more about the EVSC’s Early Childhood Education Program.
9:30 a.m. Cedar Hall; 10:45 Culver Family Learning Center
Background:
9:30 a.m.: In the EVSC, she will first go to Cedar Hall Community School. B-roll and photo opportunities will begin around 9:45 a.m.
10:45 a.m.: She will also travel to Culver Family Learning Center where several different types of Early Childhood Programs exist, including special education and inclusion classrooms, and the Mind in the Making classroom.
The EVSC began offering PreK classes in 2010 for Title 1 qualifying families. Classes have grown throughout the corporation and the EVSC is beginning to see the results of the early learning taking place in preparing students to be ready for the educational opportunities in kindergarten. The EVSC funds Early Childhood through a variety of mechanisms, grant programs and other partnerships. The State of Indiana is one of just a handful of states that does not fund early childhood programs, and Supt. Ritz has indicated she wants to learn more about the importance of the early classes for children.
Recently, the EVSC has undertaken training with Mind in the Making. Mind in the Making is a new approach to how children learn, and is a way that teachers, parents, and others in a child’s life can help reinforce. The classroom at Culver is based from suggestions by Mind in the Making, and the book of the same name by Ellen Galinsky. Collaborating with top researchers in the science of childhood brain development for the past decade, she identifies seven life skills that help children reach their full potential and unleash their passion to learn. http://mindinthemaking.org/article/high_quality_preschool_for_all_what_its_so_important/
