Sing, Dance, Move Children in all age groups enjoy visits from our SLDS Music Teacher. Our Music Teacher receives on-going training in Education Through Music, from the Richard’s Institute. This is a language-based program, in which song, movement, and interactive play promote emotional, social, cognitive, and musical development.

Music Live! The Fine Arts Department of St. Luke’s UMC, and other musicians in our community, enrich our program by providing musical performances throughout the school year. Children experience live voice, organ, hand bell, and other performances in small group settings that are specifically designed for them.

Children of all faiths and cultural backgrounds are welcome at our school!

Christian Education

SLDS is a ministry of St. Luke’s United Methodist Church and therefore Christian education is seen as a natural and important part of the daily program.  Children pray before meals, sing songs to God, hear Bible stories/value lessons suitable for their age, and celebrate major holidays of the church year.  We hope to share, through example, that Jesus loves us very much and wants us to love each other!

Children’s Chapel Time

Children enrolled in our Twos, Threes, PreK, and TK classes participate in a weekly brief and joyous children’s worship service!  The children gather to sing songs, learn a Bible verse of the month, hear a story from our SLUMC Director of Children’s Ministries, and share a birthday blessing for all of the children celebrating birthdays during that week.  Parents are invited to join us.

Service Projects

Generosity and care for others starts young!  Age-appropriate service projects include canned food donations at Thanksgiving, a special Christmas toy drive, “Souper Bowl of Sharing” in January, and a book donation later in the Spring.  Various community agencies benefit from these donations. Additionally, each of our PreK and Kindergarten classes determine a class service project. Our children have made gift bags for the homeless, written thank you letters to community helpers, donated toys for pets shelters, and grown more empathetic while completing these and other acts of kindness.

Considering the current climate of rigorous Elementary Education standards, we commit to provide a strong foundation of early literacy skills to prepare our students for their next steps and launch them into a life-long love of reading and writing!

Early Literacy Specialists

Our early literacy specialist participates in continuing education and mentoring through School Literacy and Culture, Glasscock School of Continuing Education, Rice University. Mr. Engle is an experienced classroom teacher of Threes, PreK, and TK  with a keen understanding of preschool child development and age-appropriate practice.

Early Literacy Lab – PreK and TK

All PreK/TK students visit the Early Literary Lab one full morning each week, creating a home base for intentional, consistent early literacy instruction that is supported by everyday practice in the classrooms. The instruction incorporates story dictation and dramatization, phonemic awareness, fine motor development, letter/sound recognition, vocabulary development, block construction, and other important foundational skills known to increase children’s on-going capability in the academic areas of oral communication, reading, and writing. Our young students often say the ELL day is a favorite day!