LEAP Classroom Proves To Be A Major Success!

Linn-Mar salutes the team of Peggy Wakefield, Lakshmi Radhakrishnan, Vino Damodaran, Laura Post, Emily Dolezal, and Kelly Trier. They accepted the opportunity to coordinate an Early Childhood LEAP replication classroom at Linn-Mar.
LEAP: Learning Experiences: an Alternative Program for Preschoolers, is based on the research of Dr. Phil Strain at the University of Colorado Denver.

It works to engage children who are developing typically, along with those on IEPs– Individualized Education Programs, as they develop social relationships. The program works to include kids who are at risk of being on the autism spectrum.

Over the past two years, the preschool team has spent many days with extensive training, coaching, learning and reflecting. They collected classroom data each day in two areas; academic and social. They changed the structure of the class day to allow time to tackle four questions with every single task the children performed.

What am I supposed to do? How do I know I am making progress? How do I know I am finished? What’s next?

As part of the program, trainers from University of Colorado Denver conducted performance checkpoints. To declare success, researchers knew they needed a student improvement rate of 90 percent or higher after two years. The Linn-Mar rating was 94 percent.

Congratulations to the Linn-Mar LEAP Team on their continued success with our youngest Lions!

We ARE Linn-Mar!