“I want to start with our morning message, ‘Welcome, everyone!’” exclaimed Yvonne Warren, a preschool teacher at Ann Parish Elementary. “Wah, wah, welcome!” she expressed as her students repeated the “w” sound.
It was a big day in Ms. Warren’s classroom as she taught her four and five-year-old students while State Senator Mimi Stewart, other dignitaries, and Los Lunas Schools officials observed her lesson. The visit is part of a tour from the governor’s office to determine if New Mexico preschool children are learning language development.
“We have been looking at classrooms in New Mexico and other states to look at how our teachers are doing with the science of reading,” Senator Stewart explained. She was impressed with Ms. Warren, but also with her young students.
“We heard Ms. Warren was the best and we just had a great time in her class,” said Senator Stewart. “They were well organized and well-mannered. Ms. Warren is using the Heggerty curriculum, so her students are learning phonemic awareness, how they make up words. That’s what you do when you’re that little – you focus on the sounds that words make and then later you put those words into writing and reading.”
Mariana Padilla, the state’s Children’s Cabinet Director, agreed with Senator Stewart. As former educators, they said they want to make sure the little scholars are getting a great start to reading.
“We are just really making sure we are putting funding in the schools to support literacy. We know how important it is to make sure we are investing in training for our educators in elementary school and then next will be secondary schools,” stated Ms. Padilla. “We want to make sure that teachers are prepared and make sure they are getting the support they need to be effective.”
Senator Stewart said the tour of classrooms across the state is showing families that our teachers are stepping up to the plate.
“We are just really seeing teachers focus on learning and understanding the science of reading and once they put that into practice, then we will get over the 70-80% of our students not reading and it starts this early,” she said. “Our teachers are just doing a great job here in Los Lunas.”