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Jessica Morton's Kindergarten |
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Dear Families,
Welcome to our web page, and also to our classroom. Carol and I are excited about this new way to link home and school, and hope you find useful information here.
Carol and I have worked as a team for the past 4 years with both k and k-1 students. She has been with our school district for 25 years, and I began working at the old school in town (where the Rec. Center now is) in 1973. We feel fortunate to share a classroom, our years of experience teaching here, and also to share the delights and responsibilities that each new class brings.
Please feel free to contact me throughout the year: in person, by sending a note with your child, by phone (I’m available most afternoons, after the primary-age students I work with then have gone home), or by email:
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Your insights, concerns, and perspectives on your child are crucial to your child’s progress and success this year, and during their entire school experience. I look forward to working with you!
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A Note About Home Activities in Our Class
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I consider home activities (homework) to be a very important learning reinforcement and practice for kindergarten children: building good study habits really does start now, for the rest of their school career!.
I try my best to make the assignments enjoyable for children and their families, and believe they’re a powerful way to connect school and home for each of us. Please let me know if a homework needs further explanation or more time for your family to complete it. Also let me know, please, if you don't receive a homework any Monday, so I can send a duplicate home. I would always prefer to have a homework turned in late rather than not at all.
Homework/home activities will be sent home most Mondays this year, and are usually due back at school by Friday of that week. Exceptions will be on weeks when Monday is a holiday, or when the homework needs to be returned sooner (or later). I’ll always let you know about any changes with specific assignments.
We try to balance different curriculum areas in the homeworks, so they might focus on language-arts practice, science, math or p.e. I will be using some ideas from our great new math curriculum, Everyday Math, as well as my own for our homework.
Some homework assignments will ask you to play a game or read a booklet we send home with your child. Please choose a special shelf, box, drawer or basket to store these in all year long; we’ve found that many children enjoy returning again and again to familiar materials like this, and are delighted to see their own progress as they continue to practice and improve with them.
Please let me know if there is ever a problem with helping your child complete and return their work each week. I want homework to be a pleasant shared time for all of you, letting your child do as much of the actual writing, drawing, or other work as comfortably possible for them. I expect that as the year progresses, most children will be able to take on more and more of the work themselves; check in with your child often to see how much of the load they are able and eager to carry as their skills and stamina grow this year.
Thank you!
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CALENDAR & SPECIAL EVENTS
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August 28th
First day of school!
September 1
Field trip to the beach
September 4th
Labor Day Holiday. No school.
September 8
Our first Tea Time; no snack needed this day!
Special Events -
This section will be updated during the year, with both school-wide and classroom-specific celebrations and important events listed. We expect to have several field trips around the school grounds this year, as well as in Mendocino and perhaps even farther.
We will have Tea Time generally every other Friday, starting at our regular Snack Time. This is a special chance to cook and then enjoy food together as a class. It's often linked to social studies or other topics we’re learning about. We practice our "Tea Time manners" at these celebrations, and balance the baked foods the children make with fresh organic fruit/vegetables that I buy.
I request that each family donates $5- $10 to cover costs of both the cooking ingredients as well as the fruits and vegetables we serve then. Thank you for helping support this imporant and very enjoyable ritual in our class!
Children will need to bring a mug from home, for use both at Tea Times as well as for classroom water-drinking all year.
We will also invite families in during the year when we have a program of songs, poems or something else we want to share formally with all of you. I’ll send notes home and post announcements here on our web page in advance of these celebrations.
We’re happy to celebrate birthdays in class, and you are welcome to bring in food and share this important milestone with your child. We do ask that you plan ahead with us, so we can schedule whatever treat and visiting you’d like for your child's birthday.
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MUSD Schools