Lake Superior Elementary Approach to Education
Teacher assistants works with 5th Grade helpers as all Kindergartners start the morning with structured movement activities, games, and breakfast.
By Mark Howard, Principal, Lake Superior Elementary School
At Lake Superior Elementary (LSE) we continue to strive to challenge and support our students with academic skills. At the same time we are also supporting our student’s physical well-being, social, and emotional development. Research supports the connection between a strong academic mind and physical activities that support and stimulate brain development and learning (Ratey, John, MD 2008).
Over the next two months, I will be writing a series of articles that will highlight programs and provide the research that supports the neuro-physical activities and emotional regulation supports that LSE staff has studied, implemented, and adapted that best supports the “whole child” – mind and body.
4K student works on strength, balance, agility that stimulate multiple areas of the brain. In addition, the student is using letter sounds as she names the photos attached to the floor following the pattern of a hop scotch grid.
In this series of articles, I will first write about what we do to best meet the needs of the child. In the following article, I will describe current research that supports why science believes the brain needs physical activity to grow and stimulate our ability to learn. In later articles I will talk about the specific activities/programs that our staff has built and implemented that increase our students’ vitality, foster learning, support social and emotional development, and create a sense of community within our staff and students.
Overall my plan is to write a series of articles the can be followed on a bi-weekly basis, that will help our surrounding community to see how Lake Superior Elementary goes above and beyond the core academic standards and teaches, models, and engages students in life skills that will better prepare them as lifelong learners who are healthy in all areas of life.
I hope to create an interest that will stimulate you to follow my short articles and learn more about Lake Superior Elementary. As I close this piece of writing, I will include photos of some of the activities that we have built and implemented at LSE.
