Bath Regional Career and Technical Center

NEWS

Pre-K ‘Lab' Debuts

By Seth Koenig, Times Record Staff

Published:  Wednesday, September 9, 2009 2:03 PM EDT

BATH - Tuesday marked a big day for 20 4-year-olds who arrived for their first day of pre-kindergarten at the Bath Regional Career and Technical Center. It was also a big day for a class full of high school students, who will shoulder much of the work running the pre-kindergarten class as Regional School Unit 1 embarks on a unique new take on early childhood education.  While the 4-year-old newcomers explored the novelties of the school environment for the first time, area teens kept the peace and played along. In an adjoining classroom, other technical center students absorbed a lecture on there search behind early childhood curriculum and how to manage an audience of little kids. After a while, the two groups of teens were slated to swap places."You couldn't do this program, and do it well, without the ‘lab' part of it," BRCTC early childhood teacher Gretchen Parlin said Tuesday morning. "I can talk in the classroom, but it'll never be quite the same as the hands-on sessions. We'll do (classroom work on education) theory in here, and then they'll go out there and say, ‘I saw a kid do what you were talking about.'"Under the new program being launched this fall, students at the career center will learn how to operate a pre-kindergarten class while pre-kindergartners learn how to, well, go to school."When they finish the program, they'll be able to walk into any day-care center and be effective,"said Joel Austin, who takes over as director of the technical center this year after the retirement of former director Mert Dearnley. "Our early education program has been around a long time, but the focus on pre-K represents a change of direction."

In previous years, the center played host to a child-care program. But now the facility is one of several locations being introduced as part of RSU 1's implementation of district-wide pre-kindergarten. Other sites in the district are being run by organizations such as the YMCA, Head Start and Family Focus, among others.

This school year, RSU 1 has opened the early education slots to a limited number of students. The district plans to increase its pre-kindergarten capacity annually with a goal of universal pre-K throughout the district. Overseeing the operation at the technical center are three RSU 1 faculty members: teachers Parlin and Rosalie Perkins, as well as educational technician Anne Bridgman. While Parlin conducts the classroom activities for the teens, Perkins and Bridgman supervise the pre-K side of the operation. On Tuesday, the 4-year-olds cycled through different areas of the room organized by topic -science, blocks, dramatic play and so on. The academic careers of the 20 energetic kids were only about an hour old when a reporter from The Times Record stopped in to observe, but according to Bridgman, "so far, the high school kids have been a huge help."Key to the success of the technical center's pre-K program, noted Perkins, is that the "lab"environment will be run to benefit both the young students and older ones. Perkins said the BRCTC will work with a burgeoning "Tools of the Mind" curriculum developed by researchers at the Metropolitan State College of Denver. The program focuses on fostering self-regulation and discipline among the young students, and is based on studies showing that youngsters' abilities to stay on task, ignore distractions and consider two strategies at the same time contribute more to school readiness than entry-level reading or math skills.The detailed, but fun, course load is what the older students will learn to implement.

"The big kids are going to have certain responsibilities and planning work, and they'll work with (Perkins and Bridgman)," said Parlin during a break in the classroom agenda Tuesday. While teenage students filled out some early year paperwork, Parlin noted that the technical center helpers also will cycle through RSU 1's other pre-K sites during the year to learn about different teaching styles and programs.

On the other side of a door and row of interior windows, pre-kindergartners grew acquainted with life at school."(Parents) bring their cameras and take pictures of the kids," said Perkins of the first day of fall pre-K. "It's a milestone. No matter what the birth order is, it's a milestone. It's a big moment. Some of them rode the school bus for the first time today. Nobody got off the school bus crying, so we were off to a good start."skoenig@timesrecord.com

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