Happy Friday everyone! I am sitting in my classroom as I write this.  School is done for the day, the classroom is ready for Monday and I am playing some Reggae as I finish up the work of the week. As I write this, I find myself smiling about the work of the students from this past week as well as the evidence of seeing the students applying their learning to accomplish new things.  I listened to an emergent reader read to me today.  The sense of pride he felt and the smile I had may not seem like much but the feeling is one I hope everyone gets to experience within their workspace.  It's these moments that make this job so rewarding.

This week the students continued working on their character trait writings by focusing on writing letters to me.  The genre of writing continues to be persuasive and the work continues to be done in collaboration with each other. Next week the students will start to craft their own individual piece that has a similar focus.

In science we learned how sound travels through the ear and started to discuss the concept of vibrations and how they travel to the ear. This continues to be foundational concept work that will lead to them using their learned knowledge to conduct science investigations around the sound concept. 

I hope you all had a chance to read through the report cards that were sent home. These should give you a good idea on how your child is doing and also goals that we will be working on in the core academic areas. If you have any questions about your child's report card, please reach out.

I used a part of Tuesday, to talk about Martin Luther King Day and why they had a day off. A few of the kid knew who he was and one student was able to talk clearly about him. Elaina Fox was volunteering and helped read a book that we used for the discussion. The kids learned about his values, why there was a need to march. protest, and speak up. The kids then completed a writing task about what they learned from the readings and discussions. 

NOTES:

*We should have our Winter Program this Wednesday. Please make sure to have your child prepare the night before and be ready with all of their clothing needs. 

*Please, please help your child develop a homework bag routine. There is still consistently 3-4 kids who come back empty handed. This limits their ability to take books from the classroom and also means a book is missing from our classroom library.  Your help is greatly appreciated. I can always replace a lost Ziploc bag but hate seeing my books getting misplaced. 

That is all for now.  I hope you have a great weekend.

Peace,

Mr. Young