14A Polk County Itemizer-Observer • September 23, 2015
Polk County Education
Full-day kindergarten means long days for kids, teachers
The transition requires schedule changes and building remodels to accommodate more students
By Jolene Guzman
The Itemizer-Observer
DALLAS — The magic
word in Kari Witt’s kinder-
garten class at Lyle Elemen-
tary in Dallas on Thursday is
“school.”
To her students, the dis-
trict’s youngest, school still
may seem magical.
For some, it’s the first time
they have been in an educa-
tional environment and
away from their parents for
an extended period of time.
They are learning not just
reading, writing and math,
but how to be students.
Concepts such as raising
your hand before speaking,
waiting your turn to speak,
lining up to leave the room
and eating in a group setting
are brand new for them.
“They may have eaten at
home with a couple of peo-
ple, but here I’m asking them
to eat with close to 100 peo-
ple,” said Caleb Harris, the
principal at Oakdale Heights
Elementary School in Dallas.
“That’s very exciting. You
have buddies you want to
talk to instead of eating.”
This year, their teachers
and parents are facing un-
charted waters, too: full-day
kindergarten.
The state is now paying
for kindergarteners to at-
tend full day — previously,
funding was given for just
half days — so all school dis-
tricts in Polk County are
making the transition.
That means adding more
classrooms, rearranging
schedules to add more
lunch periods, and making
time for kindergarten stu-
dents to participate in activ-
ities like art, music and
physical education.
Between Dallas’ two K-3
buildings, school employees
had to find room for approx-
imately 170 kindergarteners,
filling three classrooms at
Oakdale and four at Lyle.
Kindergarten teachers
and administrators in Dallas
studied full-day programs in
JOLENE GUZMAN/ Itemizer-Observer
Tim Rawley works with teaching assistant Gwen Dudley on sorting cards by suit, a math
exercise, during class on Thursday at Lyle Elementary in Dallas.
JOLENE GUZMAN/Itemizer-Observer
A poster teaches students
book reading steps.
Teacher Kari Witt reads to her kindergarten class.
other districts for a year.
Teachers were given 40
hours of paid planning time
this summer to create a
strategy for the beginning of
the year, which will set year-
long routines.
Kindergarteners have
three recesses and lunch,
which breaks up the day giv-
ing teachers a chance to re-
focus on the next activity.
That’s important when
working with 5-year-olds,
Harris said.
“Their attention span at
this stage of their life is
short, so you have to be pur-
JOLENE GUZMAN/Itemizer-Observer
poseful about your instruc-
tion,” he said.
Teachers also must ac-
count for “the wiggles” by
keeping the kids moving in
class. Thursday, Witt’s class
danced to a dinosaur-
themed song just before
going to recess. They have to
line up before leaving the
classroom, a process still re-
quiring a lot of concentra-
tion and guidance this early
in the year.
“They are just wiggly so
quickly and I’ve lost their at-
tention,” said Connie Olliff,
a new kindergarten teacher
at Lyle this year. “Today we
just took a walk, moving
around. Sometimes we do
some stretching.”
Dancing is the consensus
favorite, Lyle’s teachers say,
for getting 5-year-old energy
out.
The longer school day
won’t change what the
youngsters are expected to
achieve, but gives teachers
more time to help their stu-
dents meet those standards.
“We still also want to re-
member, they’re 5,” Harris
said. “I think that is an im-
portant factor that I don’t
want to ever forget. For
many of these kids, this is a
long day and they still need
to be 5.”
“We will have larger
chunks of time for math,
reading and writing so that
is beneficial,” he continued.
“We still have pretty high
standards of what we would
expect in a half-day pro-
gram. I just think it will be
more solidified. For those
kids who may struggle, we
have more opportunity to
provide interventions for
those kids who need it.”
Witt added that full days
make it possible to put ac-
tivities into the schedule
they couldn’t before.
“We have the opportunity
to add more fun back into
kindergarten because we
have more time,” Witt said.
“It’s not all reading, writing
and math.”
In Central, making room
for 215 kindergarteners
meant some remodeling of
classrooms that hadn’t been
in use previously.
Super intendent Buzz
Brazeau said the biggest
challenge has been schedul-
ing kindergarteners for
music and PE classes.
“I think it’s gone pretty
well,” he said. “We are learn-
ing new things every day.”
In Falls City, the adjust-
ment has been more for the
teacher than the students.
Elementary Principal Art
Houghtaling said 11 of the
14 students in the class at-
tended the district’s pre-
school program, which was
longer than a half day.
For the past five years,
kindergarteners in Falls City
have had full school days, the
first half in regular class and
the afternoon in a session of-
fered by the Child Develop-
ment Center and FACES
after-school program.
“It’s not a huge adjust-
ment,” Houghtaling said.
Teacher Katie Waugh is
the one needing to get used
to a new schedule, moving
from part time to full time,
he said.
School officials say the re-
sults of moving to full days
won’t be clear until the end
of the year — and will con-
tinue to be measured as the
students move through their
early elementary years.
“All the research indicates
that kids who have more
time do better,” Brazeau
said. “I believe that should
be the case, and I would be
concerned if that wasn’t the
case.”
Falls City Superintendent
Jack Thompson saw the im-
pact firsthand when he
worked in the Santiam
Canyon School District.
“Their results were amaz-
ing,” he said. “Lots of kids
would be reading by the end
of the year.”
Witt said her hope for the
switch to full day is a better
start to first grade.
“When they go to first
grade, they can kind of take-
off running because they will
be used to staying all day,”
she said. “Yes, September is
going to be an adjustment,
but it won’t take as long. The
goal is that they get more ac-
complished sooner.”