When you look closely at cities and towns with top-notch public school systems, they all share a common thread – a solid network of community support.

In the three years since the Little Compton Education Foundation (LCEF) was founded, we have been able to provide the Wilbur McMahon School (WMS) with technology and educational tools that have ignited a new level of excitement among students and provided teachers with state-of-the-art teaching resources.

Be sure to click on the “Read More” link below to see how your support has helped public education in Little Compton

Thanks to donors like you, the Little Compton Education Foundation has been able to fund more than $13,000 in new Grant and Wish List requests for the 2009-2010 academic year.

These new enrichment and curriculum enhancement programs include:

Lego Robotics Team: Students ages 9 to 14 are working together as part of two Wilbur McMahon School Lego Robotics teams that will compete in the ninth FIRST LEGO League Challenge on Saturday, January 9, 2010 at Roger Williams University.

Fourth Grade Intro to Band: Fourth graders interested in learning to play the flute, clarinet, saxophone or trumpet are now participating in weekly group lessons that teach them to read music, play their instruments individually as… Continue reading

The Little Compton Education Foundation has received a Wish List request for a teacher pack of 10 Texas Instruments TI-84 Plus Calculators priced at $1,080. Middle School students will need these graphing calculators in September, when they begin studying a new math curriculum called “Impact Math”

When it comes to teaching kids about science, technology, engineering and math, one tool that has had much success in many schools is Lego Robotics.

With the purchase of two Lego Mindstorms for Schools Kits, the Wilbur & McMahon Schools plans to offer middle school age students with the opportunity to learn about robotics as well as team dynamics and problem solving.

Two or three students will work with one kit. Working as a team, they will learn to design, build, program and problem solve real-life robotic systems. Each of these Lego Mindstorms for Schools Kits is priced at $199.

For more information on the Lego Mindstorms for Schools Kit, please see the Lego website at www.legoeducation.com/store

Remember the days when the teacher or a student wrote or sketched something on the chalkboard and then everyone in class feverishly copied that important data into their notebooks before it got erased? Well thanks to technology those days are gone. The Smart Board is an interactive whiteboard screen that works like a large computer monitor. However, unlike computer monitors, the touch screen capability allows for writing, drawing and typical keyboarding that can be saved and printed. Unlike using an overhead projector or chalkboard, the Smart Board will allow the teacher and all students within the school to save their work on a computer that is attached to the Smart Board. This unit will also allow the teacher to print… Continue reading

The kindergarten classroom recently received nine new sets of reading books and additional books geared for different reading levels. These books are a supplement to the classroom library. The cost of these books was $338.50

What’s the reaction been to the newly installed SmartBoard in the school’s music room? Regardless of whether you ask a teacher or student, the response is pretty much the same – awesome, amazing, and really, really cool.

Mr. Whitehouse has been using this new computerized whiteboard tool in classes for the past few weeks. He reports each day he and his students have been discovering new capabilities of the SmartBoard. For now he is relying on tutorials to learn the ropes, but hopes to take some classes in the near future to learn more about the SmartBoard

Electric scissor sharpener- Anyone who has ever cut fabric with dull or unsharpened scissors knows what an ordeal that can be. A recent wish list request states “Students need to have sharp scissors when learning to cut fabric. This skill is difficult for many students.”
To help students maintain the classroom scissors and shears used to cut fabric, the Wilbur McMahon School is requesting an electric scissor sharpener. Priced at $78.25, the Scissor Pro Diamond Hone Sharpener will pay for itself very quickly by saving the time that would otherwise be spent delivering scissors to a repair person and then retrieving them. Plus, it will allow all students to have access to sharpened scissors during class time instead of them… Continue reading

The Little Compton Education Foundation recently received a $4,000 grant from the Newport County Fund. This grant supports LCEF’s Community Awareness Campaign by providing funds for supplies and/or equipment needed to produce its first annual appeal letter, set up a booth at community events, and keep its website and newsletter up-to-date. The Foundation has also established an endowment to ensure that its mission is continued into the future. The Little Compton Education Foundation is one of 13 organizations in Newport County to receive grant funding this year from the Newport County Fund, a permanent endowment of the Rhode Island Foundation.  Thank you Newport County Fund!

Mixing Bowls – Six stainless steel mixing bowls, priced at approximately $7 each, are needed for the cooking classes at Wilbur McMahon School.  These new bowls will be added to the collection of glass bowls already being used and allow each class member to make his or her own batch of pumpkin bread. The bread is then donated by the class to a local soup kitchen or to the Visiting Nurse Association to be used in holiday gift baskets. This has been a wonderful community service project!