Kindergarten transition program a positive first step

YAKIMA, WASH. -- Mrs. Sosa says stand up.

And the youngsters gathered on the floor -- all sitting "criss-cross applesauce," just like they've been taught -- rise around her. The game, a version of the classic kids' favorite Simon Says, continues.

"Mrs. Sosa says reach for the sky," prompts the teacher, Noemi Sosa, in her classroom at Yakima's Adams Elementary School.

And the kindergartners comply, stretching their arms upward, as high as they can go, and awaiting the next instruction. "Mrs. Sosa says touch your ears."

Then, she encourages them to touch their feet, mouths, noses, knees, hair and elbows. The students keep up as best they can and seem to be having fun.

But they're also learning and practicing basic but important classroom lessons: Following directions and listening to and respecting the teacher.

Mrs. Sosa Says, as well as many other learning activities in classrooms throughout the Yakima School District, are part of a program designed to prepare kindergartners for the first day of school.

While classes don't officially start until Tuesday, about 75 percent ofthe district's approximately 1,100 kindergartners have already been showing up at school, learning the lay of the land, through the Kindergarten Transition Program.

In its second year, the optional program allows little learners to come to school one or two weeks early and get comfortable with their new surroundings, procedures, expectations, classmates and teacher -- before the big kids show up.

"The point of the program is social-emotional. It's not academic," says Stacey Drake, director of early learning for the Yakima School District.

She also serves as the director of children's programs for Ready by Five, an early learning initiative that aims to prepare Yakima's youngest and poorest children for kindergarten.

The initiative, primarily funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Thrive by Five Washington, offers services and programming for families in east Yakima who are expecting a child or have a child or children under age 5.

The target area covers roughly 5.5 square miles in an impoverished, predominantly Latino neighborhood, bordered by U.S. Highway 12 and Interstate 82.

The four elementary schools in that area -- Adams, Barge Lincoln, Garfield and Martin Luther King Jr. -- offer a two-week Kindergarten Transition Program, funded by Ready by Five. It costs about $222 per child for the two-week program. Last year, the total cost was about $65,400.

Nine elementary schools outside the target area offer a one-week program, paid for by the Yakima School District. The one-week program costs about $131 per child, or nearly $65,000 total.

Yakima is one of only two Ready by Five early learning demonstration communities in the state. The other is in White Center, an ethnically diverse and largely low-income unincorporated community just south of Seattle.

And the Kindergarten Transition Program is just one of the many services offered through Ready by Five. Others include home visits for expectant mothers and families with young children, parenting groups and support for child care providers.

Soon, the organization plans to build an early learning center in southeast Yakima. Construction is slated to start next spring, and the center is scheduled to open a year later. When the building is done, Ready by Five's administrative offices -- currently in a storefront at the corner of Lincoln and Fifth avenues -- will move to the new location.

Meantime, the Kindergarten Transition Program -- voluntary for students as well as teachers -- runs from 8:30 to 11:30 a.m. Both the two- and one-week programs wrap up Friday.

"It gives them a head start," Drake says.

And many kindergartners here and elsewhere could use a boost. Sixty percent of all kindergartners nationwide weren't ready for school at the start of the last academic year, according to figures from the Yakima School District.

In Yakima, that number was even greater: 70 percent. And in east Yakima, it was even greater still: 80 percent.

Most of the children from that neighborhood -- about 60 percent, according to figures from Ready by Five -- aren't enrolled in traditional preschool programs before kindergarten.

Many come from low-income backgrounds, single-parent families and homes where English is a second language.

"The kids in east Yakima have a multitude of risk factors," Drake says.

Studies show the achievement gap for children of poor families is apparent as early as 18 months. Ready by Five educators and administrators -- as well as more than 40 community partners, or stakeholders -- are hoping early childhood education, such as the kindergarten preparedness program, and continued education will break the cycle of poverty and problems often associated with it. Those issues include increased drop-out rates, teen pregnancy, depression, poor nutrition and other physical health problems, substance abuse, crime and low-wage jobs.

According to Sosa, the kindergarten teacher at Adams, the Kindergarten Transition Program makes "a positive impact.

"It gets the students prepared for academics," says Sosa, in her third year at Adams and her second participating in the kindergarten readiness program. "It helps the teachers learn their students."

It also helps them get to know the parents. Kindergarten teachers participating in the program at the four schools in the Ready by Five target area make a visit to students' homes, meeting with their parents or guardians.

"The teacher comes and sits on the couch and says we have something in common: I care about your child," Sosa says. "It's building relationships with parents so they can trust in you."

In her classroom earlier this week, most of her incoming 25 kindergartners were getting used to a new routine.

They learned their teacher's name, school's name and names of many of their peers, where to put their stuff, where to sit at lunch, and what to do when the bell rings, signifying recess is over.

They played Mrs. Sosa Says, repeated their ABCs and received plenty of positive reinforcement and praise: "Thank you for raising your hand," "You guys have really good control," and "I really appreciate those who are sitting criss-cross applesauce, hands in their laps."

They got lots of reminders, too: "Your eyes need to be up" when walking down the halls, Sosa advised her charges, adding, "You're walking like little mice in a straight pencil line."

Last year, 294 kindergartners in the target area -- or 79 percent of kindergartners who attended the first day of school at Adams, Barge-Lincoln, Garfield and MLK -- participated in the Kindergarten Transition Program. The goal, Drake says, was to reach 250 students in the target area in that first year.

This year's goal was 300. Final attendance totals for the target area -- as well as the other nine schools -- aren't available yet, Drake said.

However, "Attendance looks better this year than last," she says.

Districtwide, the Kindergarten Transition Program served 789 kindergartners -- or 71 percent of kindergartners who attended the first day of school -- in 2008.

And nearly all of the district's 53 kindergarten teachers participated. Only two opted out, and that's because they are both out of town this week, according to Drake.

"It's a great program," says Julie Martin-Beaulieu, assistant principal at Adams. "It makes school less intimidating."

Martin-Beaulieu says she noticed a difference on the first day of school last year, after the end of the 2008 pilot Kindergarten Transition Program.

"It was much smoother," she says. "The anxiety level of both the kids and the teachers was reduced."

Kindergartners, Martin-Beaulieu, says "knew all the routines." And, "We had no runners."

It's not unusual, she explains, to have a couple of youngsters try to make a run for it on the first day of kindergarten. In the past, Martin-Beaulieu has prepared for this phenomenon by wearing tennis shoes. She wore them last year, but says she ended up not needing them. She's not planning to wear them Tuesday.

"I have no fear at all about needing them," she says.

* Adriana Janovich can be reached at 509-577-7653 or ajanovich@yakimaherald.com.

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