Great Start!

Hello everyone!
I hope you found the newsletter enclosed in your child's Friday Folder. There are a couple of items I would like to note here, and I will send this home in your child's homework folder on Monday.

1. Homework folders: this week, your child will come home with a math contract sheet, and a reading log. The activities on the math contract are meant to cover 3 weeks. Your child DOES NOT need to do more than one activity per night. For the reading log, simply record the book(s) your child read with you, and the minutes spent reading. You can keep the reading log in your child's folder. Also, if you place homework in your child's folder and it is still there the next day, please leave it in there. It just means I did not get to collect it, but will as soon as I have the chance to get it. Next week, your child will come home with a set of 5 sight words to learn. I will highlight the words to learn, and they need to be flashed to them on index cards. They will also need to practice writing the words on paper provided.

2. Behavior Expectations. Last week your child learned all about what is expected in the classroom. Our three main rules are: Be Safe, Be Kind, and Be Clean. If a child receives a warning, but continues to break one of the rules, he goes from green to yellow. If the behavior continues and does not improve, he or she will have a talk with me. If it still does not improve, a note will go home, and he/she will move his/her card to red. I did have some students go to red last week, but I did not send home any notes. I told them this week they were still learning and practicing. This upcoming week, they will be held more accountable for their actions. Please know that I am very patient, and I know they are still adjusting to being there for a full day, and still learning what being a first grade student means. More often than not, I give them many chances (far beyond two) before having them go to yellow or red. The main behavior we are currently working on is raising your hand to speak, and not talking while others are sharing or teaching. If your child went to yellow, I will send home a note in their homework folder. If they went to red, a red note will go home. I will follow up with an e-mail or phone call.

Again, I am loving your little ones, and I can't wait to see them tomorrow! They are doing a fantastic job!

Love,
Mrs. Richards