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Eagle Update: Washington Learning Center (WLC)

Washington Learning Center continues to be a fun and exciting place to learn and grow despite doing it during a pandemic. This year has brought all of us many new challenges, but together we are working to provide our youngest learners with a wonderful educational experience.

The WLC staff and students have been amazing at implementing new expectations, keeping everyone healthy and preventing any spread of the COVID-19 virus. Some of the strategies implemented have been colored spots on the floors and cafeteria seats to indicate safe spacing, staggered time to use the restroom and access the lockers; shared seating charts with classrooms and specialists; wearing face coverings; increased focus and opportunities for hand washing, and new individual desks for the kindergartners. Teachers have also been embracing the school vision of outdoor learning which is in line with strategies for teaching during the pandemic and have brought the classroom outside more than ever. We have one dedicated teacher providing distance learning to the families who choose that as their learning model this year.

The children at WLC haven’t had the opportunity to engage with the community or have guests in the building, but there have been some great alternative activities. Our preschool students visited Oak Hills and built snowmen outside the windows and our kindergarten students had a read along with the New Ulm Steel team members virtually on Dr. Seuss’ birthday. The connections to the community are very important to us and we look forward to finding new ways during this unusual time.

The WLC Kindergarten Registration event, held on the afternoon of Thursday, April 15 and the morning of Friday, April 16, will also be different this year. We will be outside providing the children with a taste of what outdoor learning is all about at WLC and meeting with parents.

We are very excited to welcome and meet our new families to WLC at Kindergarten Registration in April. We also look forward to a time, hopefully by next fall, where we can welcome guests into the building and engage with the community once again. We encourage you to check out the WLC, ECFE and district social media sites to get a glimpse of what we are doing at WLC.

Community Education classes will now be available for this spring and summer. A brochure with all of the information will be available on the Community Ed website and in the Journal on March 27.

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