Our first week is complete!

Dear Room 230 Families,

All of your children have successfully completed week 1 of Sensational Second Grader Training and what an AMAZING week it was! This week, our focus was on learning more about each other, our classroom and our routines in order to begin creating a cooperative and cohesive learning community. Each full week of school, you will receive a newsletter in your mailbox sometime between Friday afternoon and Sunday. You can also connect to this newsletter through our classroom website. Please read this newsletter each week and use it to: 1. Stay informed about what your child is learning and doing at school 2. Know and take any action that is required, such as sending back permission forms and 3. Communicate with your child about his/her school experience. This demonstrates to your child that what s/he is doing all day is IMPORTANT and you value education. In the beginning, these newsletters may be   L O N G  , however there is so much new information to relay right now. I promise that they will shorten as we get more into the year. Thank you in advance for staying connected to the happenings of our classroom community.

Also, thank you for sharing your kind and enthusiastic children with me every day. I truly look forward to seeing their smiling faces every morning! 

IMPORTANT DATES FOR FAMILIES TO REMEMBER:

Monday, 9/11: Back to School Brown Bag homework due.

Thursday, 9/21: NO SCHOOL - Rosh Hoshana

Monday 9/25: ASCA begins

Please notify me in writing if you decide to enroll your child in the PTO's After School Creative Arts Program (ASCA) as this will affect dismissal plans. Please visit the ASCA site if you are interested in learning more or registering for classes.

Wednesday 9/27: EARLY RELEASE DAY - 12:30 dismissal

Wednesday 9/27: Back to School Night/Open House - more information TBA. 

IMPORTANT NEW INFORMATION FOR FAMILIES:

WHEN TO KEEP YOUR CHILD HOME WHEN SICK: 

We have a student in our class with a suppressed immune system, meaning that this student gets sick quite easily. We ask that you strictly adhere to the Newton Public School's policy on keeping your child at home when s/he is sick. Although this protocol states that the school nurse will determine if your child should stay home, we ask that you keep your child home in the morning if any of the conditions in the protocol are true for your child at that time. Thank you in advance for helping to keep our community safe. The policy is outlined below:

 EXCLUSION FROM SCHOOL FOR SUSPECTED COMMUNICABLE CONDITIONS 

POLICY: 

Students suspected to have a contagious health condition can be excluded from school at the discretion of the school nurse. The purpose of this exclusion is to prevent the spread of disease that can cause absence and discomfort for other students and staff. Some conditions may require immediate dismissal. Written documentation by a health care provider may be required for school re-entry. 

PROTOCOL: 

The school nurse will assess each presenting condition on an individual basis. 

A student will be excluded from school if he/she has: 

 A fever of 100 or greater in the past 24 hours 

 A communicable disease diagnosis 

 A cold in the active stages – coughing, sneezing, nasal drainage 

 A sore throat and/or swollen neck glands 

 Vomiting or diarrhea in the past 24 hours 

 Acute pain that requires relief by narcotic medication 

 An undiagnosed rash or skin eruption 

 Head lice that have not been chemically treated 

Parents should make every effort to pick up children as soon as possible when notified by the school nurse. 

Emergency contact information must be up-to-date.

ATTENDANCE: 

While we ask that you do not send your child to school when s/he is sick, we do ask that you send him/her to us every other day when s/he is not sick. Each day, our curriculum builds upon the previous day and when there is an extended absence, your child misses a lot of academic content. Here is the NPS Attendance Policy from the Student Rights and Responsibilities Handbook :

B. Regular Attendance

Regular attendance in school is required by Massachusetts’ law (G.L. c.76, §1) for all persons between the ages of 6 and 16. It is the shared responsibility of each student, his or her family, and the school to ensure that the student attends school each day that he or she is not sick. Failure to attend school, except under extraordinary circumstances, will require school personnel to seek help for the student and the student's family through court action and/or through the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families.

When a student reaches the age of 16, he or she may withdraw from school with the

permission of his or her parent or guardian. The parent(s) or guardian(s) may meet with the Superintendent or his or her designated representative prior to the student's withdrawal from school for the purpose of discussing the reason for the student's withdrawal and the alternative educational programs available to the student. The student will be told that he or she may resume his or her education even if he or she has withdrawn from school pursuant to this procedure. When a student permanently leaves school, the administrator of the school must send notice to the student/parent/guardian and hold an exit interview in accordance with G.L. c. 76, § 18. For more information on High School Exit Intervention, go to http://www.doe.mass.edu/dropout/2014-05ExitProtocol.pdf

A student may be re-enrolled in school after an extended absence, but academic credits and promotion to the next grade are likely to be seriously jeopardized by the student’s lack of academic progress during the extended absence. Therefore, lengthy absences for extended trips are strongly discouraged by the Newton Public Schools, as teachers cannot provide the advance assignments or study aides a child would need over long periods of time to maintain the pace of learning in his or her classroom.

LUNCH, SNACK AND RECESS:

This year, your child eats lunch at the early hour of 11 a.m., so we will eat our snack in the afternoon. Our daily schedule allows 15 minutes for snack + recess each day.  Fresh air and exercise are as important as food and water for everyone so my goal is to have snack outdoors as many days as possible. Our class will sit together for the first minutes to eat, then after they clean up their space, we will play! Please send in a simple snack in a snack bag each day. One example of a simple snack = water + a piece of fruit + a granola bar.  Also, only send in water to drink. Juice, Gatorade, soda will not be permitted as snack beverages in our classroom. If your child brings in something to drink other than water, they will take it home, unopened. Thank you for your cooperation as we work together to make this short break in our academic day as healthy as possible.

ASK ME ABOUTS:

Each week in our newsletter, I will provide you with these conversation starters so that you can connect with your child about the many happenings at school. When talking about school, remember that this is always a 2 way street; You can surely add more to your child's knowledge base and understanding during these conversations.  

Ask me about...

• my favorites this week
• reading stamina (What is it and how did you practice it?)
• what we did with our letter trays this week 
• where all our letters start (and maybe you could even ask your child to sing "Where do we start our letters?")
• smart lunch choices
• what's math?
• the card game that I played 
• any fun games or songs we learned this week
• some things I learned about my new classmates, my teachers or any new friends I have made this week

LOOKING FORWARD:

In this section, you will see a bit about what we will be working on next week. You should begin conversations with your children at home about these topics as well.

Looking forward, we will:

• continue to learn more about one another and develop routines around how we will cooperatively work together this year
• set learning goals for ourselves for second grade
• determine what students need from each other and their teachers to be successful this year in order to begin drafting our classroom constitution
• continue to launch Reader's Workshop by learning routines and increasing our reading stamina
• begin work in our math journals as we review material from first grade

Have a great weekend!