Mary of Lourdes Catholic School
Little Falls, MN
Preschool - 8th Grade
Kindergarten
Mrs. Marjorie Markkanen
mmarkkanen@molschool.org
I have been a kindergarten teacher at MOLES for 23 years. Prior to teaching kindergarten,I taught in the Early Childhood/Family Ed program as an early childhood and parent educator for 13 years and I continued to teach in that program in the evenings for many years. It's safe to say that I love to be around little people!! I have wanted to be a teacher since I was in second grade. I attended college at St. Ben's in St. Joseph which is where I realized that I wanted to be a Catholic educator.
At Mary of Lourdes, I teach in the same classroom that my own children attended kindergarten in, which is one of my biggest blessings. The very best part of teaching kindergarten is being a part of the spiritual growth of the youngest children in our school. Helping them become kind, confident followers of Jesus is such a joy. My favorite part of each day is praying with my students and learning from them.
When I am not at school you can probably find me on an adventure with my husband, Mr. MIke. We like to spend time in our childhood home town of Cloquet/Duluth, especially hanging around my favorite place: Lake Superior. During the winter we can be found at the hockey arena....watching whomever is playing our favorite game!
Mrs. Wanda Marie Gau
wgau@molschool.org
My name is Wanda Marie Gau and I am one of the kindergarten teachers. I have been a Catholic School Educator since 1984. My husband and I have three daughters who are alumni and our two grandchildren are students at MOLS. Our family values the education received from Mary of Lourdes School!
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I feel blessed to do what I feel called to do- help children know and love Jesus along with the beliefs of the Catholic Church. I feel very privileged to walk with children on their faith journey.
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The kindergarten classroom is an exciting place with lots of opportunities to explore, wonder, and learn. We read, write, count, create, and play in an atmosphere that is supportive of the varied learning styles. Kindergarten is awesome!
Curriculum
Language Arts/Communication:
-Be ready to read and write skillfully for many purposes.
-Be able to listen for information, think clearly and solve problems about language.
-Listen to, tell, and talk about books and stories with skill, for a variety of purposes.
-Students will be able to draw and tell about pictures to show ideas and sequence.
-Learn to tell about thoughts in a group discussion.
Math:
-Understand the relationship between quantities and whole numbers up to 31.
ie: count forward and backward, read, show value, show more and less, compare and order.
-Recognize, create, complete, and extend patterns. ie: AB, AAB, AABB, ABC
-Recognize two and three dimensional shapes and use them to model real-world objects.
-Compare, order and measure objects.
Science:
-Understand the five senses and how they help us.
-Know about common plants and common animals.
-Learn about physical environment.
-Know about nutrition and the food groups.
Social:
-Learn why rules are important and how to stay healthy and safe.
-Recognize the difference between needs and wants.
-Know a map and where things are.
-Be able to tell how people are alike and different.
-Know the difference between past, present, and future.
-Be able to tell about their family and compare it to others.
Religion:
-Students will learn to pray in many different ways, recite prayers and Bible verses, and learn about the Roman Catholic Church,
the Feast days and holidays.