Welcome to kindergarten at Akers Elementary!

My name is Kayla Holzschuh and I am so excited to be the "first stop" on your child's educational journey. This is my first year in the district and my first year teaching. Prior to earning my teaching credential, I worked as an instructional aide for students with differing abilities. I also student taught in first grade where I ran an intervention program, with the help of my school's literacy specialist, supporting students with their alphabet and reading skills. 

I grew up and currently reside in my hometown of Visalia, California. I earned my associates degree from College of the Sequoias and earned my BA degree with an emphasis in STEM education from Fresno State University. I am engaged to my wonderful fiancé, whom I have been dating for five years. We are super excited to get married soon and start our family in just a few short years. I enjoy reading, drawing, and spending time with my loved ones in my free time.

Our kindergarten program is an all day class, which allows us to really "dig deeper" into our units. We are fortunate to have full time aides who assist us with our programs like Reading Mastery. Reading Mastery is a strong phonics program that teaches students to decode words and become readers. We supplement our reading program with "Wonders", which provides level appropriate stories, vocabulary, story retell and other skills that enhance our curriculum and student learning. We use a hands-on learning approach for mathematics and science. We teach students not only the "how" aspect of math and science but the "why", which provides them a deeper understanding of how these subjects work and their importance in everyday life. Students will learn a variety of ways to demonstrate what they know in our classrooms. We utilize technology to engage and enhance student learning. Students learn how to use, create, and share their learning on their very own iPad. We strongly believe in embracing change and adapting our teaching to meet the needs of our students in these ever changing times. 

I utilize several ideas and programs to support my classroom management. We create our classroom rules as a class and refer back to them often throughout the year. I use group points for each table and give out "Eagle Bucks" for our eagle store when groups earn our agreed upon amount of points. I also use desk pets. Students must earn ten individual points to adopt their very own desk pet which they get to name and take care of. I also use an app called class dojo. Students earn points on this app each week for listening, staying on task, sharing, being kind, etc. At the end of the week, students can turn their points in for a prize out of our classroom treasure box. I also use bucket filling. At the beginning of the year we read a story called, "Have You Filled a Bucket Today?", which discusses how everyone has an invisible bucket and when you are kind to someone you fill up their bucket as well as your own but when you are unkind you dip into your bucket as well as the person you were unkind to. Then I introduce our classroom bucket. Each time a student does something kind they place three pom poms in our bucket. Once the bucket is full the whole class gets a reward. I also use lucky duckies as one of my equity tools, to ensure each student has a chance to share and participate in our class everyday. 

I am committed to cultivating a classroom environment where your child is safe, valued, loved, and feels like the integral part of our family of learner/thinkers that they truly are. I believe that we (myself and my students families) are a team and our communication is vital to student's success. Please feel free to email me , contact me via parent square, or come talk to me in person about any questions or concerns you may have both before and after school. Your family and your student are very important to me and I am so grateful to be on this journey with you! I look forward to learning and growing together!