Transitional Kindergarten

1. Transitional Kindergarten Standards, Curriculum, And Special Education

2. Welcome Cara Peterson Visalia Unified School District Director of Special Education, Preschool-Sixth Grade Connie Smith Tulare County Office of Education Instructional Consultant

3. Enrolling Kindergarten Eligible Children with Disabilities • Children outside of the TK calendar range can attend Year 1 of the two year program. • It is an IEP decision for Children with Disabilities and should be considered only for children with developmental delays but who are progressing. • The District can obtain ADA for these students. • A continuance form would need to be completed at the end of the school year for these students. This reflects parent notification of the continuance.

4. Enrolling Kindergarten Eligible Children with Disabilities • There may be some early birthday children that would benefit due to developmental reasons, but Transitional Kindergarten shouldn't be viewed as remediation, because it's not. It is the first year of a two year Kindergarten program. • If a student is already enrolled in a regular kindergarten and then is identified as a child with special needs, the IEP team may determine it is in the student’s best interest to be moved to a 1st year classroom.

5. Benefits for Students With Disability • Participate with same age peers • Additional exposure to concepts and curriculum due to slower pacing • Support for language acquisition • Increase opportunities for social development • Help parents of students with special needs to feel comfortable with the idea of schooling

6. Reading Standards: Foundational Skills • RF. K. 1 Demonstrate understanding of the organization and basic features of print. • Follow words from left to right, top to bottom, and page by page. • Recognize that spoken words are represented in written language by specific sequences of letters. • Understand that words are separated by spaces in print.

7. Reading Standards: Foundational Skills • RF. K. 2 Demonstrate understanding of spoken words, syllables, and sounds (phonemes) • Recognize and reproduce rhyming words. • Count, pronounce, blend, and segment syllables. • Blend two to three phonemes into recognizable words. • Know and apply grade-level phonics and word analysis sills in decoding words both in isolation and in text. • Demonstrate basic knowledge of one-to-one-correspondences by producing the primary or many of the most frequent sounds for each.

8. Reading Standards • RL.K.2: With prompting and support, retell familiar stories including key details. • RL.K.3: With prompting and support, identify characters, settings and major events in a story. • RL.K.10: Actively engage in group reading and activities with purpose and understanding.

9. Writing Focus for Year 1 • Developing as a writer depends on the writer’s understanding of how a particular written language looks and the writers language and thinking skills.

10. Writing Standards • W.K.1 Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to compose opinion pieces in which they tell a reader the topic or the name of the book they are writing about and state an opinion or preference about the topic or book (e.g. My favorite book is…). • W.K.2 Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to compose informative/explanatory texts in which they what they are writing about and supply some information about the topic.

11. Speaking and Listening Standards • SL.K.1 Participate in collaborative conversations with diverse partners about Kindergarten topics and texts with peers and adults in small and larger groups. • Follow agreed-upon rules for discussions (e.g., listening to others and taking turns speaking about the topics and text under discussion). • Continue a conversation through multiple exchanges. • SL.K.4 Describe familiar people, places, things, and events and, with prompting and support, provide additional detail.

12. Language Standard • L.K.5 With guidance and support from adults, explore word relationships and nuances in word meanings. • Sort common objects into categories (e.g. shapes, foods,) to gain a sense of the concepts the categories represent. • L.K.6 Use words and phrases acquired through conversations, reading and being read to and responding to texts.

13. Strategies to Meet the Needs of Children with Disabilities • Use consistent classroom routines. • Visual reminders of transition times and activities. • Pre-teach new concepts and content vocabulary to children with disabilities prior to group instruction. • Model procedures, expectations, or directions.

14. Strategies to Meet the Needs of Children with Disabilities • Post permanent visual reminders of the class schedule and expectations. • Break multi-step instructions into single units. • Identify verbally and visually when transitions will occur. • Movement activities promote task engagement and focus

15. Contact Information • Cara Peterson • Director of Special Education Preschool-Sixth Grade • Visalia Unified School District • cpeterson01@vusd.org • (559) 730-7581 • Connie Smith • Instructional Consultant • Tulare County Office of Education • connies@ers.tcoe.org • (559) 651-3044