The Senior Capstone is a cross-curricular, inquiry-based research project. First introduced as part of a pilot during the 2012-13 school year, students are challenged to apply all the lessons of their four-year Catholic educational experience by actualizing the traditions of our school’s two founding orders, the Marianists and the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur. All projects connect back to Catholic Social Teaching. Seniors work in groups of two, three or four for an entire year to complete four phases of the Capstone. The third phase requires students to present their research and findings at the school’s Stang Symposium. Approximately 40 different projects are covered, with topics ranging from the sanctity of life and homelessness to self-image, fair trade, environmentalism, poverty, and more.
Partnering With Bishop Liebold School To Teach Fine Motor Skills to Young Preschoolers
Julia Cannon ‘26, Olivia Cristiano ‘26, Mia Di Biase ‘26, and Tamryn Papalios ‘26 love working with young children. Under the mentorship of Jenna Legg, director of ministry and service, they pursued an opportunity to teach crucial fine motor skills, like tying shoes, to preschoolers in Misti Papalio’s classroom at Bishop Leibold School. The group explained that fine motor skills are small movements with the hands and fingers.
The capstone group’s mission is to teach young preschool students at Bishop Leibold School fine motor skills they can use throughout their lives. Once a week, the seniors meet with the preschoolers to set new goals.
“Our motivation is helping young kids to succeed in their future and to be able to see progress that truly makes a difference in their everyday lives,” said Olivia Cristiano ‘26.
A Mission to Enhance the Lives of Preschoolers By Teaching Them Fine Motor Skills
Realizing that fine motor skills are important for preschoolers’ development, this group focuses on strengthening small muscles and coordination, which can help develop early academic skills and boost independence with daily self-care tasks like fastening buttons and tying shoes.
Turning Mission into Action
“We are implementing this by going to Bishop Leibold once a week and teaching the students a new fine motor skill as well as tracking their progress from our initial skills test we took the first week,” said Cristiano. “We then plan to take a final skills test to compare to the first one in order to see our progress.”
Why This Work Matters
According to this group, their capstone project is essential because a child’s brain develops during the first five years of life. Mastering fine motor skills before kindergarten can have a lasting impact on these preschoolers’ academic careers.
“This is important because we prepare these children for new skills,” said Cristiano. “With our lessons, there will be so many new things they will be able to do with their new fine motor skills. Our project’s social justice cause is inadequate education. By working with small groups of preschoolers, we want to help all children in this classroom have the same opportunity to learn these skills because they will need these skills in the future.”
This capstone group learned a lot from this experience, including a new appreciation for early childhood teachers.
Cristiano said, “Working on this project has changed everyone in this group’s way of thinking about teachers and how hard they truly work. We also learned that all kids learn differently and at their own pace. It is important to cater to the students individually to meet their learning styles.”
As Cannon, Cristiano, Di Biase, and Papalios reflect on their project, they realize that this experience has made a lasting impact on more than the preschoolers.
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@little.life.lessons.capstone