August 16th, 2016

Dear Parents,

I would like to share with you our learning journey through grade two. Each day I aim to inform you of what we did inside of the classroom. This way when you ask your child "How was school today?" or "What did you learn?" you will not get that same old answer of "nothing". I am sorry, but this will only be available in English. 

Today was a great day as the students made their way up to the second floor into P2, ready for lots of learning. In the morning we got to know a little bit about myself, Miss Hepburn. I am from New Zealand, I have one brother (23 years old) and one sister (8 years old), I love to cook and bake, I have travelled to 16 countries, and my favourite colours are pink, mint green, and aqua. Students then got to look at a few pictures of my family and my summer vacation.

Next, we made a classroom agreement. As a class we came up with many rules we would like to follow each day. Students then made an outline of their hand to put on the agreement, as a promise to their classmates and myself (sort of like a signature) that they will be considerate members within our classroom community. 

We then had Daily Five time. Students went over the procedures of 'read-to-self'. We looked at two ways we can read a book (pictures or words), and found different spots around the classroom that were comfortable to read on (cushions, circle mats, chairs, floor, tummys etc). It is important to give students choice of where they read to ensure they maintain their reading stamina (length of reading). 

To end the day we created name tags for our cubbies, wrote some goals we wanted to achieve soon and/or this year, and played a game called 'All my friends'. 

Topic starters/questions you could talk about with your child:
- Tell me about the book you read with Miss Hepburn 'Morris goes to School'?
- How do you read to self?
- Where did you like to read?
- What are some rules on the classroom agreement?