Murrieta Valley Unified School District

SDAN Contact: Faythe Mutchnick-Jayx Title: Principal, Lisa J. Mails Elementary School Mailing Address: 35185 Briggs Road Murrieta, CA 92563 Phone: 951-304-1880

Lisa J. Mails Elementary School

Additional Members of District Delegation:

• Char Gollogly, Director of Curriculum and Instruction, Murrieta Valley Unified School District
• Chrissy Thomas, Teacher, Lisa J. Mails Elementary School
• Mary Eskridge, Teacher, Lisa J. Mails Elementary School

Lisa J. Mails Elementary School opened in August 2007 as a school with an emphasis on the visual and performing arts. We have belonged to  SDAN since our opening and have used the resources of the network to help shape our arts focus. We appreciate the support that we have received, particularly the training in the arts standards and opportunities to share with others who are integrating arts into the regular curriculum to enhance learning for students.
Program Highlights:

• All students take part in two arts showcases each school year, one for visual art and one for performing art. The showcases are organized around school-wide themes and our school’s centrally located quad is transformed into an outdoor theatre and art gallery for the day.
• Each year, we host a school-wide Artist Fair in which artists of every kind come to our school and share their passion with our students. This provides students with a greater understanding of who can be an artist and gives them exposure to numerous art forms.
• For the past several years, our grade levels have implemented arts rotation time within the school day.  During this time, classes take part in specific experiences in each of the arts disciplines from a classroom teacher who “specializes” in the discipline. This has been a way to off-set the limitation of being an arts-focused school without any teachers assigned as art specialists.
• This year, our focus has been implementing art and art integrated lessons in each classroom, by each teacher, in order to develop each teacher’s comfort level in all of the disciplines. Grade levels have created year-long calendars for implementing lessons and they have used PLC time to discuss the process and share ideas.
• The district provides our school with a band teacher who teaches band to all interested fifth graders. With extra time allocated for our focus, this teacher teaches general music to all fourth graders and collaborates with other grade levels to provide music instruction in grades K-3.
• Each year, funds are allocated to support an Artist-in-Residence program. Some years, this has been a person or company outside of our school, and other years, we have released classroom teachers with specialties in dance or ceramics to work with other grade levels. The Artist-in-Residence experience provides students with an extended opportunity to learn from someone who has a greater experience and knowledge in the arts. Some of these experiences have resulted in artwork or performances for our arts showcases.
• All students in grades 3-5 are able to join a school choir which meets once a week, during the school day, and which takes part in area festivals. Our school has an after school Performing Arts Club, which is open to all students and holds two performances a year, and an after school Dance Team, which includes a try-out process and limited membership. Our After Class Enrichment (ACE) program, taught by teachers, parent volunteers, and high school volunteers, provides numerous art opportunities to all students as well.