Dear Families,
As we enter the final weeks of summer and prepare for a new school year, we bring you a very exciting update that will enhance the learning opportunities for your child in ourEnfield Schools classrooms.
We are very proud to tell you that the Enfield Schools are the recipients of a very generous grant fromThe LEGO Foundation, LEGO Education and Enfield-based LEGO Systems, Inc. called the Building Tomorrow Project. ThisLEGO-based curriculum outreach program is designed to foster and develop any child’s full learning and creative potential.The grant donates proven classroom solutions that are enriching and foster hands-on, minds-on learning so that children are prepared to build their own tomorrow, along with ongoing teacher training and development.
Each of our seven elementary schools will participate in the project. Parkman, Eli Whitney and Prudence Crandall schools will have a dedicated LEGO Creativity Center, supplied with all the materials needed to engage students. Children will learn everything from math and science to language arts and reading comprehension in new ways using five innovativeLEGO Education classroom solutions combining LEGO sets designed for the classroom with relevant curriculum and teacher training.
LEGO Education empowers teachers to meet key STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics) learning objectives while inspiring students to do and learn more both individually and collaboratively. The new LEGO Education curriculums have been integrated into the Enfield Public Schools curricula by teams of teachers for grades K, 2 &4. These grades will begin implementation this fall. The remaining grades (1, 3, 5) will begin in 2014.
This 3-year pilot program will guide more than 125 of our classrooms and nearly 2,000 Enfield students in a new way of learning. Fifty-one of the K, 2nd and 4th grade teachers have received training and are very enthusiastic about their experience. LEGO Systems and The LEGO Foundation are providing a full-time dedicated educational advisor to the program, located right here in Enfield.
Studies will be conducted throughout the course of the program to measure the success of the project and provide opportunities for real-time tweaking as necessary. In addition to evaluating improvements in student attendance and test scores, the research will assess their growth in skills necessary to compete for 21st century jobs including the ability to collaborate in teams, the advancement of their skills in creative problem solving and critical thinking and a demonstrated improvement in their written and oral communication skills.
Thousands of schools throughout the U.S. use LEGO Education sets in the classroom. These schools consistently report success in several areas including student achievement, teacher motivation and overall school performance. We will be providing updates on the program later in the school year but in the interim, please address questions to Chief Academic Officer, Anne McKernan ([email protected]) in the administrative offices.
We hope that you are as excited by this news as our teachers and administrations are. Should you have any questions,please don’t hesitate to contact the administration office.