Keyser Elementary School’s first preschoolers will find a space splashed with color and carefully prepared by teacher Kirsten Catloth.
Ms. Catloth has rolled out a cheerful alphabet rug, arranged a cozy reading corner. She has set up a writing desk where children will sit in a little blue chair and practice their letters.
The mostly bare walls will fill up quickly with kids’ art and projects, much as the new preschool classrooms around the Toledo Public Schools district soon will bustle with 3 to-5-year-olds.
This back-to-school season brings an expanded preschool program to TPS, where youngsters can attend class at eight sites.
In addition to Keyser, TPS will open preschool classrooms at Birmingham, Pickett, Rosa Parks, Sherman, and McKinley elementary schools using federal Title I funds. Toledo also will offer preschool at Oakdale and Ottawa River elementary schools to serve children with disabilities using a combination of federal and state dollars.
That expansion will boost the district’s total number of early education locations to 25, with an enrollment of roughly 1,500 preschool and Head Start students.
“The primary reason we are doing this is because we know that … early intervention makes a difference,” said Amy Allen, TPS transformational leader of early childhood and special education.
The district began its Head Start program in 2014, after a TPS-led group secured a five-year grant that provides about $8 million a year.
TPS has been growing its preschool offerings beyond the legally required classes for children with disabilities. Last fall, it added preschool sites at Harvard, Martin Luther King, Jr., Leverette, Navarre, and Ella P. Stewart elementary schools.
It costs TPS about $175,000 to $200,000 to operate each preschool classroom, an amount that includes teachers with four-year degrees, assistants, materials, and other expenses, Ms. Allen said.
The district reallocated some Title I funding to ramp up its preschool program. Several pilot reading programs were among the cuts, said Chief Academic Officer Jim Gault. District officials believe more can be accomplished by redirecting that money.
“Title I money is intended to be used [for] interventions for children who are at risk, and we believe that preschool or early invention is the ultimate intervention,” Ms. Allen said.
The district placed preschool classrooms in schools where they hope to boost kindergarten-readiness scores. Classes are capped at 17 students, and students can attend the full-day Title I-funded preschools at no cost to families, she said.
Preschool gives children a chance to refine social skills, gain independence, practice their motor skills, and ease into academics by introducing youngsters to numbers and letters, advocates said. Children should be able to write their name by the time they leave preschool, she said.
Ms. Catloth will teach the alphabet, the sounds of letters, and rhyming. Her students will spend time in dramatic play and block building; art, music, and gym, plus take naps.
Celeste Jackson’s 4-year-old daughter will attend a second year of TPS preschool. She’s become more social with other children, learned to follow a routine, and created a folder full of projects that her mom plans to preserve in scrapbooks. From day one of preschool, Ms. Jackson said her daughter ran into the classroom and fell in love with school.
“I’m loving this because it’s starting to prepare the preschoolers more for kindergarten,” she said. “It is a very positive experience. The teachers are very kind, they love the students, they have all kinds of programs.”
TPS is still accepting applications for preschool. For more information, contact the TPS Pupil Placement Office at 419-671-9100.
Preschool classes begin Aug. 29, after the Aug. 18 start with a half-day for elementary students and full-day for high school freshman. All high schoolers start Aug. 19; kindergarteners start Aug. 24.
Contact Vanessa McCray at: vmccray@theblade.com or 419-724-6065, or on Twitter @vanmccray.
First Published August 14, 2016, 4:00 a.m.
