Happy New Year!

Good Afternoon,

As we launch into a brand new school year I wanted to say it was a great week getting to know all of the students a little bit better every single day. It is a very fun and outgoing group, and I am excited to see all that the students accomplish and grow this year both academically and socially. They showed tremendous perseverance getting through the first couple of days with how hot it was, and as we all transition back into our school routines. I am looking forward to a great school year, and embarking on this learning journey with each and everyone of them.

Week in Review:

Leader in Me: As a Leader in Me School, one of our 5 Core Paradigms (our view),  is that caregivers, family members, and teachers partner to support the whole student. View this resource to learn more about Leader in Me! 

Writing: Writers worked this week on using strategies to help when coming up ideas for narrative writing. They then took some of those ideas and brought them to life writing powerful true stories.

Math: The mathematicians set the course for how they want math to look and sound this year, and then started learning some different models to use when working with multiplication. We used number lines, ratio tables, area models, arrays as some methods and models for multiplication.

Reading: Readers learned strategies on how to read intensely to grow ideas. We worked hard on building back our reading stamina, and I am excited to see the growth the readers are going to make this year in reading pushing their thinking!

Content: We used our time in content this week to establish classroom routines and procedures, come up with our class mission statement, class jobs, and get to know each other more as we begin the new year together!

A Look Ahead: 

  • Google Calendar/Homework - Students will be forwarding their Google Calendar update for homework that day to me, and then I forward it on to families. They are able to write a message home as well in their Google Calendar update, and you are more than welcome to respond to those, and I just communicate that with them. Homework will almost always be either 20 minutes of reading or 20 minutes of math time to work on their Home Connections packet. The Home Connections packet is problems we are working on in school, and should be extra practice. Not all of the packet we will get to so some problems may seem more difficult if we haven't covered it yet. I told the students to set a 20 minute timer, and whatever they get done during that time is all they need to do. Homework shouldn't be longer than 20 minutes any night because spending time doing activities, recharging, spending time with family/friends are what that time should be for after school.
  • i-Ready (Fall Window) -  Next Tuesday and Wednesday we will have our fall i-Ready to get our initial data to help guide next steps to help students reach their goals.
  • Back to school forms - Pink and white sheets filled out and returned at your earliest convenience is greatly appreciated
  • Picture RE-TAKE day is October 10th
  • NDLC Merch will be for sale September 12th-21st
  • Backpack Buddies Collection: For the week of 9/25-10/2 we will be collecting items for St. Joseph's Food Pantry. If you would like to bring in items we are collecting granola bars, macaroni and cheese, boxes of oatmeal in individual packets, or cans or packets of tuna or chicken.
  • September 28th - Family Night at Badger Sports Park
  • September 29th - No School
That's all for this week!

Enjoy the Weekend,

Mr. VW



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