President Theodore Roosevelt’s message of working hard to achieve something important despite the critics and despite the hard work in-volved is as true today as it was in 1910. The NM PED FOCUS chose President Roosevelt’s speech as an inspiration for the type of educator we wanted to recognize with The NM Public Educa-tion Department FOCUS Tiered Quality Rating and Improvement System Outstanding Educator Award. This year’s recipient is Ms. Rhonda At-taway, Principal at the Career and Technology Education Center (CATE) in Farmington, NM. This award recognizes exemplary public school preschool programs in New Mexico. The award plaque states: In Appreciation for Daring Greatly to Provide High Quality Early Childhood Educa-tion and Inclusive Practices for All Children.

In This Issue• OutstandingEducatorAwards• LETRS Training Opportunity• Revised Lesson Plan• What’s in it for me? • Bright Spots• ConsultantSpotlight• References

University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center/ CDD / University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities Education, Research, and Service

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of the deeds could have done them better.

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly…who at best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly. –President Theodore Roosevelt Citizenship in a Republic (Man in the Arena Speech)

N E W S L E T T E RNovember 2016

In this month’s FOCUS on Young Children’s Learning Newsletter our professional development topic is the LETRS Training and effective practices in literacy. We also feature the revised NM PreK/FOCUS lesson plan. In our What’s in it for me? section we provide hyperlinks to One Page Resources from the NM PreK website for teachers and administrators. Our Consultant Spotlight features one of our new consultants, Kathy Bishop. In the Bright Spots article there are stories from the field of how inclusion is working for children and staff in New Mexico preschool classrooms and a hyperlink to the New Mexico Early Childhood Guide for Inclusion Birth-5. We hope you enjoy this issue of the FOCUS on Young Children’s Learning Newsletter.

Mrs. Attaway is a seasoned special education teacher and elementary and preschool administrator. Her experiences taught her the value of inclusion at all levels. When asked why she initially chose to develop inclusion programs at the CATE Center she said, “I knew what was possible. I felt uniquely qualified to lead this initiative.” When talking about children in her program with identified special education needs, she is passionate about her beliefs, “They are kids first, you treat them like kids. You may make changes in instruction for their learning needs, but they are kids first.” Rhonda Attaway attended NM PreK administrator training and was a participant in the NM PED FOCUS Stakeholder meetings. She is always quick to point out that she has had tremendous support from teachers, other administrators, PED NM PreK and PED FOCUS in this process: “When I went to the FOCUS stakeholder meeting, I realized that our district had already begun an inclusion program, in a small way,” she said. She decided to build on this work. Mrs. Attaway reached out to Farmington Special Preschool principal, Bill Knight, to begin an inclusion program. Rhonda Attaway continues this collaboration with Andrea Garcia, the current principal of the Farmington Special Preschool (FSP). The FSP now funds a special education resource teacher (Niklas Shepherd) at the CATE Center to provide support to the NM PreK teachers in meeting students’ special learning needs in the general education setting. He states, “I can’t say enough how great the teachers and educational assistants are that I get to work with as the inclusion teacher. They all bring a variety of different skill sets to their classrooms and pour their hearts and souls into it. Last year the amount of change and growth I was privileged to see in the kids was remarkable. There were kids who were extremely nonverbal and by the end of the year they are providing us with 5-6 word sentences without prompting. Kids who had goals to initiate play with others were now playing with 2-3 other children consistently. They

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Congratulations!had opened up socially and we could really see their personalities and interests.”

Mrs. Attaway began with just one pilot program in the 2014-2015 school year at the CATE Center. Teresa Jaquez was the teacher in the pilot program. Mrs. Jaquez told me, “I would not trade one minute of the time I have had with these kids. They have added so much to my classroom and life! I will never forget any of them and am truly grateful for the experience of having these students in my class.” Parents appreciate having their children with special needs being included in the general education

setting. Mrs. Jaquez shared this: “Last year I had a boy in my class. He was a very sweet and affectionate child. His mom texted me the other night to say how much he missed me and wanted to come back to PreK. It made me cry! She thanked me for being such a positive influence in his life, and it meant so much to me. It made it all worth it!”

Rhonda Attaway continues to dare greatly! She has implemented inclusive programming at The CATE Center, Esperanza Elementary School and opened a new inclusive program this year at Animas Elementary School. Her advice to others about inclusion is: “Do it!” Even if you have to start out small, start! She says, “This has been successful because the staff has believed in the program and worked very hard.” Mrs. Attaway, Dr. Gene Schmidt, Farmington Superintendent, and the CATE teaching staff were recognized by the New Mexico Public Education Department for their exemplary work and their leadership in providing high quality inclusive programs for preschool students at the Farmington Public School Board Meeting on August 11, 2016. Rhonda is quick to shine the spotlight on her staff and the amazing work they do each day at the CATE Center to make sure all children have high quality learning experiences. Teachers - Kris Barnhart , Molly Bottom, Ashley Decky, Kelly Hanon, Teresa Jaquez , Savannah Lillywhite, and Niklas Shepherd - all received Certificates of Recognition for their work in the area of inclusion from the New Mexico Public Education Department.

LETRSTraining Opportunity

The Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling for Early Childhood Educators (LETRS for ECE) Module is here to support teachers in effective literacy instruction. The New Mexico Public Education is sponsoring the LETRS Training which is required for licensed preschool teachers and administrators participating in FOCUS and New Mexico PreK Programs. This training has been well received by teachers throughout the state.

LETRS provides research-based professional development for early childhood educators in the area of literacy. In this training, teachers learn how to help pre-kindergarten children learn the early literacy and language skills shown in research to be critical for later academic success. Participants learn to intentionally plan activities to promote literacy goals. Many of the sample activities can be found in, Building Early Literacy and Language Skills (Paulson, Noble, Jepson, & van den Pol, 2001).

The LETRS Training has three main goals:1. Learn the definitions and concepts related to early literacy and language, the processes involved, and the developmental sequences by which these develop.2. Expand strategies used to design and implement rich learning activities that are engaging, effective, evidenced-based, and developmentally appropriate.3. Describe and discuss assessment procedures to make the best use of data in teaching our youngest learners. This important process identifies what the children know and what they need to be taught.Check with your PED FOCUS consultant or visit the Adobe Connect registration site at https://cddunm.adobeconnect.com/admin/show-event-catalog for the dates and times of a LETRS Training near you.

What is the LETRS training and how will it benefit my students?

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The LETRS training has really supported

learning in my classroom. I like the multiple reads. It has really helped

with comprehension. The children love the syllable taps. Our kids are able to slow down and get all parts of the word: the beginning,

the middle and the end.

—Kaleena Sampson, Preschool Teacher

Farmington Public Schools

The PED FOCUS/NM PreK Weekly Lesson Plan is designed to provide a format for public school preschool teachers and assistants to document the varied experiences they plan for and provide to children in their classrooms each week (“NM PreK Lesson Plan Procedure Manual,” 2011).

New Mexico PreK has required a uniform lesson plan for many years. The NM PreK lesson plan was introduced to participating NM FOCUS programs in the 2015-2016 school year. Based on feedback from teachers, the lesson plan was revised this summer to make it more user friendly and to align with the Early Learning Guidelines (ELG). Here are some highlights of the revised lesson plan:•Thelessonplantemplatedesignincludesdrop-

down menus for teachers to denote the NM Essential Indicators that correlate with the planned play opportunities, reading, math, and science experiences as well as large and small group activities. Each center has a drop down menu for the Essential Indicators (EI’s). This feature is an efficient use of the teacher’s planning time.

•Thereisanaccompanying document that explains the lesson plan and its new features.

•Thelessonplanincludesaspaceforatargeted literacy goal and a targeted social emotional goal each week. This section also includes a drop down menu with goals for the teacher’s convenience.

•Thelargegroupsectionofthelessonplanprovides a place for the teacher to record the first, second, and third readings of a book. Each of the readings has a link to a “One Page Resource”.

•On the third page of the Teacher Reflection section, teachers now plan for outdoor time.

Hyperlink to Lesson Plan on NM PREK website: https://www.newmexicoprek.org/https://www.newmexicoprek.org/index.cfm?event=public.prek.MaterialsTeacher&cachefix=85

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Revised Lesson Plan

I like that everything is right at your fingertips. They have hyperlinks. You don’t have to look for it. —Preschool Teacher at AODCP Training

I thoroughly enjoy the lesson plan that has been implemented. This is my first year teaching with NM PreK so I am not used to the prior format but the transition from my experience over the last six years to this format has been wonderful.I enjoy the drop down boxes being available and not having to retype the same information or having to copy/paste. The flow of the lesson plan makes it easy to fill out quickly but with detail if necessary. I like the teacher choice option for an extra center as well as the reflection area. I have found the reflection area to be helpful in the next week planning. That section makes me look at myself critically and what I could implement into my schedule or what isn’t necessarily helping the student growth and can be removed. —Rebekah McKnight Hobbs Public School

PED FOCUS Revised Lesson Plan Rolls Out to Positive Reviews!

This tool will help the teachers see all the information they need in an efficient document that is user friendly. It is a time saver. It will help them to consider different planning options. —Andrea Garcia, Principal, Farmington Special Preschool

Your PED FOCUS consultant is available to assist you with questions about inclusion. The consultants have access to materials, research, and trainings to support inclusion in your program. We hope you enjoy the New Mexico Early Childhood Guide to Inclusion Birth-5 found by connecting to http://www.cdd.unm.edu/ECLN/PSN. Here is the actual link to the manual: http://www.cdd.unm.edu/ECLN/PSN/common/pdfs/Inclusion%20Guide%20April%201.pdf

Great things are happening for young children in New Mexico! This section of our newsletter showcases “bright spots” that happen in our classrooms every day. We encourage you to send information on your “bright spots” and promising practices occurring in your preschool programs to suzanneharperfocus@gmail.com. We will do our best to include them in the newsletter. Here are some reflections from preschool teachers about their experiences with inclusion. A hyperlink to the New Mexico Early Childhood Guide for Inclusion is included at the end of this section.

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Bright Spots

What’s in it for me?

Last year we had a boy with a visual impairment. When he first came in to our classroom he was very unsure. He moved very slowly and was very reluctant to try new things. On the playground, uneven surfaces scared him and he would not attempt to step up onto one of the plastic borders

we have that separate the dirt from wood chips. By midyear he was climbing up the stairs on the play structure, going down the slide, and moving much more quickly. In the classroom, he always wanted to try new things. He had one good friend in the class that didn’t care that he couldn’t see. They led him around the playground and made him run. He played willingly. By the end of

the year, he was doing the monkey bars without assistance, running on his own, and no longer in fear of trying new things. He moved so quickly we called it “super ninja speed”. —Kris Barnhart Preschool Teacher, CATE Center

The greatest benefits I have experienced with inclusion in our PreK classrooms revolve around best practices and appreciating differences. When implementing IEP strategies I now draw greater emphasis on the need to scaffold and differentiate for every child. I have a greater awareness of each child’s strengths and abilities. The children have had greater exposure to diverse abilities and I believe they have been able to develop greater compassion. They are able to help their peers that do not share the same strengths and have more opportunities to appreciate diversity.

—Savannah Lillywhite PreK Teacher, Animas PreK

For Classroom Teachers-Help with your lesson planning! NM PED FOCUS consultants can model how to use the Webbing from the NM Early Childhood Guide for Inclusion for Early Childhood Educators Birth-5 (p. 36) to facilitate lesson plan development.

Here is a link to “One Page Resources” to assist with your lesson planning.https://www.newmexicoprek.org/index.cfm?event=public.prek.MaterialsOnePageResources&cachefix=9073

For Administrators-NM PED FOCUS consultants can model how to use “Quick Looks” forms for classroom walk-throughs. The following link will take you to the NM PreK website. Click on the Administrative One Page Resources. This will provide you with three additional resources to assist with your work. https://www.newmexicoprek.org/

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Brown, B. (2012). Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent and Lead. New York, NY: Gotham Books.

Early Childhood Learning Network (2014). New Mexico Early Childhood Guide for Inclusion Birth-5. University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, Center for Development and Disability, Early Childhood Learning Network, Albuquerque, NM.

NM PreK Lesson Plan Procedures Manual. (2011). NM.

Paulson, L. H., Noble, L.A., Jepson, S., & Van den Pol, R. (2001). Building Early Literacy and Language Skills: A Resource and Activity Guide for Preschool and Kindergarten. Longmont, CO: Sopris West.

Consultant Spotlight

References

P E D F O C U S S t a f fTerri Tapia, Education & Development Manager 505.249.1133 TBTapia@salud.unm.edu Jody Alpers, Training & Development Consultantjodyalpers@yahoo.com

Sally Green, Training & Development ConsultantSAGreen@salud.unm.edu Vonell Huitt, Training & Development ConsultantVonell.huitt@vlhresources.com

Diane Leven, Training & Development Consultantdianelevennm@gmail.com

Emily Renfro, Training & Development Consultantemrenfro@salud.unm.edu

Nancy Treat, Training & Development ConsultantJKTNRT@msn.com

Kristy Jones, Program Coordinator505.269.7720 kristyjones@salud.unm.edu Kathy Bishop, Training & Development Consultantkathyabishop21@gmail.com

Suzanne Harper, Training & Development Consultantsuzanneharperfocus@gmail.com

Deborah Jackson, Training & Development Consultantdebjackson@salud.unm.edu

Barbara Maxwell, Training & Development Consultantbamaxwell@salud.unm.edu

Alex Ruiz, Training & Development ConsultantLARuiz@salud.unm.edu

For more information on the CDD PED FOCUSplease visit www.cdd.unm.edu/ecln/ped-focus

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