Welcome to St. Lawrence MWF AM and PM Nursery School!

“We are a Catholic School family dedicated to nurturing and celebrating a love for Jesus Christ and educating the whole child with academic excellence.” 

Weekly News:

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"Stars of the Week":  Sofia J. (AM) and Nola B. (PM) were our "Stars of the Week!

Reading:  We read the books Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed and The Story of Valentine's Day this week.  We begin each story time with songs about the parts of the book (Front cover, back cover, title, and spine!") and how to read and write ("Top to bottom, left to right, left to write!").  We predict what will happen next in each book.  We also are learning what the Author and Illustrator do for each book.

Writing:  We used block manipulatives, felt board pieces, markers, tweezers, pom poms, glue sticks, crayons, circle counter, monkey stickers, scoops, liquid glue, dice, dot markers, paper strips, and tongs this week to strengthen our hand muscles and pincher fingers so we can hold our writing utensils correctly.

We learned that when we color, we should hold the crayon with a grip that seems like an alligator chomping down on the crayon or a crab's claw.  It needs to be a three-point grip.  We need to keep the students from using a fist grip.  We talked about how we only color on the paper and that we have to use "little strokes for little folks" and not scribble with big lines.  We need to use different colors on all our pages, because God made the world with lots of different colors in it.  Finally, we need to color in the lines and color in all the white space.  

Math:   We introduced the Number "5" this week.  We read the book Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed and we retold it using felt board pieces.  We sang the familiar song too!  We used different felt board pieces to identify the numbers zero through five and count out animals to represent those numbers.  We found the Number "5" on the wall and showed how it can be represented with a numeral, dots on a tens frame, and a written word.  We learned the poem "A hat and a neck and a big fat belly.  Five has eaten too much jelly!" and used that to help write the number in the air and on our #5 paper.  We used our pincher fingers to count out five block manipulatives and make a tower of five.  We spent time "Counting our Blessings" and said five different things that we were grateful for in our lives.  During Small Group Learning and Play Centers, we used tens frames to count out Numbers 0-5; we traced the Number "5" and used tweezers to place pom poms on "5"; we counted out five jacks pieces and glued them to our jacks game paper; and we placed monkey stickers on another "5" page.

We count the days on our calendar and our classmates in our lines every day.  We compare the lines using the words "bigger/smaller", "more/less", etc.  We also create patterns when lining up (boy/girl, A/B pattern).  We finished our report card assessments:  sorting by shape, size, and color this week.  We also assessed creating A/B Patterns and one-to-one correspondence.

Alphabet:  We do not learn our letters in alphabetical order.  In our Handwriting Without Tears curriculum, we begin with letters with straight lines, then we move on to those with curved lines, and finally we learn about the ones with diagonal lines.  We will continue to work on the letters we've already introduced:  L, F, E, H, T, I, U, C, O, Q, G, S,and J.

We are learning to identify our names that our parents and God gave us.  We are recognizing that everyone's name starts with a different letter and each name has many different letters in it.  In the beginning of each class, we identify our name tags and place them on our "Purple Wall".  We are doing much better writing our names!

Religion:  We learned about another saint this week:  St. Valentine.  We read the book The Story of Valentine's Day.  We talked about how he was a real person who was a "Follower/Friend of Jesus" who lived in Rome a long time ago.  The "king" at that time said that all the men could not marry so that they could be soldiers in his army.  St. Valentine wanted the people to be able to marry and performed many marriages.  He was put in jail for disobeying the king.  While in jail, a young blind girl brought him food and letters and Valentine prayed for her and she was able to see again!  He then sent a letter to her saying "Love your Valentine", thus the first Valentine card!  We asked God to help us express our love for others just like St. Valentine did. We created a paper bag puppet that looks like St. Valentine.

We are practicing to make the sign of the cross correctly.  We recite three prayers (beginning of the day, before snack, and end of the day).  Following our prayer, we ask St. Teresa of Calcutta (Mother Teresa), St. Lawrence, St. Nicholas, and St. Valentine to pray for us and to help us be good friends who are kind to others and who love Jesus.  We bless ourselves with Holy Water as we leave the classroom at the end of class each day.  We are focusing on asking God to help us make good green/thumbs up choices, follow directions, and make us good friends as we bless ourselves.

Science:  We sing our "Weather Watcher" song and our "Seasons" song during Calendar Time.  We learned that the weather helps us to identify which of the four seasons we are in:  "Winter".

Social Studies:  We recite the Pledge of Allegiance every day and will continue to stress how we have to thank God for allowing us to live in this great United States of America.  

Social and Emotional:  Since this may be the very first time many of us have been away from our families and caregivers, separation anxiety is still a daily struggle and is very typical.  We are trying to ease our little cutie pies' fears and allow them to feel those feelings without making them embarrassed or shaming them.  Our goal is make every student feel safe, loved, and heard.  We are also working on our listening skills and trying to follow directions throughout the class time.  We need to respect our new friends by keeping our hands and feet to ourselves as well.

Music and Songs:  We sing songs about the parts of our books and how to read and write as well as all our calendar songs ("Days of the Week", "Months of the Year", "Weather Watcher", and "Seasons") and nursery rhymes daily.  We are still singing our January Song since it's been so cold outside:  "The Snowman Song" and our February Song:  "Skinamarink".  All the words to our songs and prayers are located on one of the tabs on this website.  We finished our monthly songs "If You're Happy and You Know It", "Five Little Pumpkins", "Five Fat Turkeys", and "The Advent Song".

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Our daily schedule is displayed in our classroom so the children can make the connection when it is dismissal/"home time."

Mark Your Calendars:

(All 2025 - 2026 School Year Dates are TENTATIVE.)

Mid-Winter Break -- Wednesday, February 11 - Tuesday, February 17:  Classes resume on Wednesday, February 18.

Doughnuts with Dad -- Friday, March 13:  All fathers (or other persons who will take Dad's place at the celebration) must have taken the Protecting God's Children workshop or refresher course and have a completion certificate on file in the Attendance Office.  They also must have passed a current Criminal Background Check.

Wednesday, March 25 -- Professional Development Day for the Teachers:  NO SCHOOL.

Easter Break -- Thursday, April 2 - Sunday, April 12:  Classes resume on Monday, April 13.

Muffins with Mom -- Beginning of May TBD:  All mothers (or other persons who will take Mom's place at the celebration) must have taken the Protecting God's Children workshop or refresher course and have a completion certificate on file in the Attendance Office.  They also must have passed a current Criminal Background Check.

Grandparents Day -- Mid-May TBD

Last Day of Nursery School -- Wednesday, May 20

End-of-the-Year Nursery School Play Date -- First Week of June TBD

Contact Information:

Mrs. Lisa Marcopoli

lmarcopoli@stlawrenceparish.com

586-731-0135 x251

Teacher Aide:

"Ms. Martha" Pickett