Dear families,

We are so excited to have spent an awesome first week together getting to know each other, setting up routines, and having fun while learning!

Our Beliefs

Thank you to all of you who joined us for our Meet Your Teachers night last Wednesday! Here is a recap of what was shared about our beliefs:

• We strive for a warm, safe, and welcoming classroom culture that is filled with meaningful relationships, engaging learning experiences, and joy. We want all children to feel loved, seen, valued, heard, and appreciated. We foster collaboration and a mindset of working together by developing teamwork skills. We are better together and stronger together.
• Relationships are gifts! They are key to learning about ourselves and each other. We believe in fostering love, kindness, gratitude, and positivity through every interaction. Every single ATOMIC interaction is an opportunity to uplift others to help brighten their day and make our environment a more positive one. Each ATOMIC interaction is foundational to building better relationships.
• In all of our learning, children begin at different levels and we do our best to help them grow from where they are. We plan activities that will encourage them to be in their stretch zone because being challenged is where they grow most, not by staying in their comfort zones.
  • We started learning about the differences in comfort zones, stretch zones, and not yet zones last week with a fun activity physically moving around to understand the differences. If you’d like to learn more about stretch zones, read an article by me titled A Simple Way I Show Students They’re Growing Every Day published on Teacher2Teacher. Many parents and students have commented on this at the end of the year as an important life lesson.
• We want to help students discover their strengths, values, beliefs, and how they shine. All students have leadership qualities already. We foster these skills through opportunities and by noticing, naming, and nurturing leadership skills we see. If you’re interested to learn more, I wrote an article about the Gift of Leadership.
• Believe in students until they believe in themselves…then believe in them more. This is so important in building their self-confidence. Children who believe in themselves feel more safe and confident to take more risks and challenge themselves too. We foster a belief that they are their own loudest cheerleader!

Communication

To learn more about which teacher is in the classroom and when during the week, visit our About Our Class page. More information about Scholastic Reading Club can also be found here.

You will be receiving updates on what is going on in our classroom via blog posts. When there is a new post, you will receive an email notification.

Students will also be reflecting and sharing their learning through SpacesEDU, which is a digital portfolio. More information will come at a later date.

Reading

Your child has an EPIC account through our class. Our class code is ycr9510 (think, you can read 95-10 to help you remember). This accessible anytime between 7 am to 3 pm. They have access to over 40,000 books, audiobooks, and learning videos. So if your child is at home sick for the day, feel free to have them read on Epic if they are feeling up to it!

Reminders

• Please fill out the Parents as Partners – Getting to Know Your Child form before we meet. Thank you for the ones we already received and for your time to fill out.
• Please sign up for your appointment to meet with us on September 21 or 22. For more information on how, please check out the Gilmore website for specific instructions.
• Join us at the Gilmore Community BBQ this Thursday, September 22 from 2-5pm!
• Every Thursday morning, there is a great opportunity to meet with Mr. Greenwood, our Community Coordinator, and other parents for coffee, snacks, and conversation! Come into the Community Room when you are free on a Thursday from 9 to 10am. All are welcome!
• Students will be presenting their All About Me bags next week. Please have them bring in their items on Tuesday. Thank you for helping your child prepare a few sentences for each item.
• Please pay for planners on School Cash Online. Thank you!

Thank you so much for reading this post. We aim to have weekly updates so look for the email notification on the weekend.

We appreciate you for all of your support! Anytime you have questions or concerns, please feel free to contact us. We are looking forward to working as partners in your child’s education.

So excited to see how the year unfolds as our hearts connect each day!

Gratefully, Ms. Chan & Mrs. Paulich