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":  Dion D. (AM) and Amelia D. (PM) were our "Stars of the Week"!

Reading:  We read the books Mary's Baby, I Just Like You, and Nicholas of Myra, Giver of Many Gifts 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 hexi snaps, scissors, markers, crayons, stick glue, paint brushes, linking blocks, and manipulative toys and craft materials  this week to strengthen our hand muscles.  All those things will help us to build those 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 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, and O.

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".  This week, we finished our Name Tracing and Name Writing Assessment.  

Religion:  Our formal Religion lesson was about "St. Nicholas".  His feast day is December 6.  Many families place one shoe outside their door before they go to bed the night before.  If someone has been kind, caring, loving, and generous like St. Nicholas, there may be a small gift inside the shoe when they wake up on December 6th!  St. Nicholas surprised us on Monday when he visited STL and dropped candy canes in our shoes.  St. Nicholas was Bishop of Myra in what is now Turkey.  He was a "Follower and Friend of Jesus" and is a saint because he was so generous and caring to the people around him.  He is the real Santa Claus!  Many things he did are the basis of traditions we have regarding Santa (and not just that he looks like Santa!).  

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, and St. Nicholas 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:  "Fall" typically has chillier weather when we have to wear a jacket and the colder weather brings a change of color to the leaves on the trees.  The leaves also FALL off the trees during autumn!  Even though it has been snowy, it is still Fall!

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 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") daily.  We learned our "Advent Song" to remember how we should wait for Jesus' birthday.  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", and "Five Fat Turkeys".

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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.)

Grinch Day -- Monday, December 15:  All students are encouraged to dress in green or as a character from the book/tv show/movie (The Grinch, Max the Dog, Cindy Lou Who, etc.).

Christmas Book Exchange Books Due -- Wednesday, December 17:  A detailed note was sent home.  This is the only gift we will exchange with our classmates this year.

MWF PM Class Christmas Party -- Wednesday, December 17:  The only gifts we will exchange are the books.  A detailed note went home about that already.  This is the LAST DAY of school for the PM Class due to the half-day of school on Friday, December 19th.  (The PM Class DOES NOT report on the 19th.)

MWF AM Class Christmas Party -- Friday, December 19:  The only gifts we will exchange are the books.  A detailed note went home about that already.  Dismissal for this half-day of school is at 11:40 a.m. for our program.  The rest of the school will be released at Noon.

Christmas Break -- Friday, December 19 at Noon through Sunday, January 4:  Classes resume Monday, January 5.

Contact Information:

Mrs. Lisa Marcopoli

lmarcopoli@stlawrenceparish.com

586-731-0135 x251

Teacher Aide:

"Ms. Martha" Pickett