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Room 7 Newsletter # 1
3rd February, 2010.
Dear Parents/Caregivers,
Greetings and welcome to the 2010 school year! I trust you all enjoyed your school holidays and you are ready to start the year off enthusiastically. My son and I arrived back from 10 nights in Los Angeles yesterday, so we have had a particularly special holiday.
My name is Cathy Aldridge and this will be my seventh year of teaching. Your child is in Room 7, Year 3 in the Fantail Syndicate. The Fantail Syndicate consists of Rooms 5,6,7,8 and 9. These rooms are both Year 3 and Year 4 classes. Our syndicate leader is Janice Reynolds who is in Room 8.
School Value
The school value for this term is based around belonging and self management. We will be exploring independence, motivation, confidence, participation, risk taking, resilience, honesty and integrity. I will also be looking at rights and responsibilities and how we contribute to the world. I will use these words with the children so feel free to talk to them at home using this language. I aim to explore one of these aspects each week in depth.
Learning Areas.
Our school wide theme for this term is Ocean Alive. This is a Science and environmental based theme. In the first two weeks, Room 7 will be looking at celebrating ourselves; our relationships with others; keeping ourselves safe; bullying; our school values and being confident kids. We will finish the term off by exploring Easter.
In Mathematics we are looking at number and in particular focusing on addition and subtraction. We will also study statistics throughout the term as well.
Our writing programme consists of daily writing. Where possible we will integrate our theme with our writing. This term we are concentrating on recount writing. Recount writing is based on children’s previous experiences. Previous experiences enable ideas for writing to come easier. Each term we will also study poetry.
For the first three weeks of this term we are reading from our browsing boxes. This will enable our classroom routines and expectations to be established before introducing our instructional reading. It is vital that your child reads nightly. I want the children to see reading as an enjoyable and pleasurable activity. You and I can help do this by text selections and being seen to enjoy reading ourselves.
Physical Education consists of swimming for the first part of the term. Small ball skills and summer sports will be concentrated on once the pool becomes too cold to swim in. Please ensure your child brings their named togs and towel to school daily. If your child is unable to swim I expect them to have a note from you.
I trust that you will establish good homework routines with your child. Homework will be in the form of a weekly sheet outlining what is expected. This will be given out on a Monday and is due in on Friday to be marked. We will start these sheets next week. Let me know if your child is struggling to complete these and we can arrange an alternative option.
Administration
We are proud to be a Sunsmart school. Please help us by making sure your child comes to school with sunscreen on and sensible clothing that covers their shoulders. School hats are compulsory this term. I encourage the children to leave their hats in the cloak bay at night to avoid being forgotten. Please ensure that hats are clearly named.
To stop children running to the toilet to blow their noses, I would appreciate a donation of a box of tissues from each family. I would also like each child to bring an old named t-shirt to school for use during art.
Thank you in advance for these matters.
Our library day is Tuesday at 1.30pm. There is a box in the classroom where the children can return their books once they have finished reading them. The children are allowed one book at a time. Please teach your child to be responsible for their own book.
Our email address is room7@pillanspoint.school.nz. We also have a website: www.pillanspoint.school.nz On this website you will find our classroom page. I will keep this up to date with what is happening in our room. Once we all become a bit more familiar with this there will be opportunities for you to comment on your child’s work that is displayed there.
Classroom Rules and Consequences.
The children will establish these in order to help create our classroom culture. I will then send a notice home to let you
know the behaviour expectations within Room 7.
If you have any concerns, I will be available to talk to between 8.30am and 9.00am. If this does not suit, we can arrange an alternative time.
I am looking forward to meeting you all and setting up the lines of communication.
Kind regards,
Cathy Aldridge.
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