She can write her name, identify letters and numbers, recognize shapes and patterns and even sound out words. Six-year-old Karley Jo Jackson has well exceeded the learning standards required of a kindergartner.

But her teacher at Twin Echo Elementary School in Collinsville said many of her students are beyond those basic skills.

"They can go on Word, type a sentence, use the space bar and punctuation and insert a picture," said Jody Valerius of the more than 20 students in her class.

Last week, Karley Jo sat down one-on-one with Collinsville High School student Sydney Snider for an assessment of her skills. Snider, an 18-year-old senior, is a student-teacher in the Collinsville Area Vocational Center's early childhood education program. As part of the program, she comes to Twin Echo three times a week for one-and-a-half hour sessions to observe and assist Valerius.

"Can you tell me the sound these letters make?" she asked Karley Jo as they sat at a small table next to a coat rack in the hallway outside of the classroom.

Karley Jo breezed right through the sounds, anxious to get back to recess with the rest of her class. Valerius will use the assessment to provide Karley Jo's parents, Kim and Lawrence Jackson, with a mid-quarter progress report.

"It gives the parents a heads-up on what that child needs to work on so when the third-quarter report card comes out, they won't be surprised," Valerius said.

Report cards are distributed four times a school year with the next one scheduled for March 16, Valerius said. Unlike the one-page progress report that assesses about 18 skills, report cards are much more detailed. They provide results for the testing of 36 skills under the categories of language arts, mathematics, and fine, motor and general skills.

Valerius said that students were also being prepared for software-based testing the following week. The results of those assessments will be used to help the district develop and improve instruction. Valerius said that even though her students are only 5 and 6 years old, they don't have a problem with working independently on a computer for 45-minute testing sessions.

"They have headphones on and they have to follow directions to click on the right answer," she said.

Some students like Karley Jo actually prefer the computer testing to the one-on-one assessments.

"She helps me," Karley Jo said of her session with student-teacher Snider, "but I kinda like to do it by myself."

But Snider isn't daunted. She said working with the kindergartners has been very different that working with 3- and 4-year-olds in the Vocational Center's preschool program.

"With toddlers, you play; with these guys, you're teaching," she said, adding "now I know I want to be a teacher."

Contact reporter Ramona C. Sanders at 618-344-0264, ext. 136