First Day Newsletter

September 5, 2017

Dear Parents/Guardians,

Welcome to a new school year in Grade 2! I hope that all students and families enjoyed their summer and feel refreshed and ready to dive in to a busy and rewarding school year.

My name is Mrs. Hoogenraad and I am very excited to be starting at St. Philip Catholic School this September. Although this will be my first year here, I come with 8 years of classroom teaching experience. I started my teaching career in Toronto with the Toronto Catholic District School Board. While there, I taught grades 3 and 4, as well as special education in a class for children with Multiple Exceptionalities. Upon moving to Ottawa, I have had a wide range of teaching experiences that include grades 1, 2, 6, and 8, as well as Autism classes, Primary Special Needs, and children with developmental disabilities. My years of experience, combined with my range of teaching opportunities, make me feel confident that this year at St. Philip will be nothing short of a huge success!

AGENDAS:

Each student will be receiving an agenda. This will be a very important tool for helping students stay organized, as well as an important tool for Home and School communication. Agendas will be checked once a day at school for any notes or communication from home. Please do not hesitate to write notes/information/questions whenever necessary. Students will also fill out their agenda at the end of each day with homework tasks or reminders.

Please be sure to sign the agenda nightly so that I can be sure that information is being received at home.

I have provided a Ziploc bag for each child. It will be used to help students protect their agendas and any forms or notes that need to be sent back and forth from school to home. Please return the agenda each day in the Ziploc bag.

BLOG:

I will be sending home a link to my Blog by mid-September. The Blog will be a place where parents and students can go to read about some of our latest learning experiences in the classroom, as well as reminders for upcoming events and deadlines as they arise. I will also be including links to online resources that will be intended for home.

HOMEWORK:

In Grade 2, students should be reading for a minimum of 20 minutes each and every night. Students can read independently or do some shared reading with a family member. Books, magazines, newspapers, child-friendly articles online, recipes while cooking… these all can count towards the 20 minutes!

CLASSROOM:

Please ensure that your child has both indoor and outdoor shoes at school everyday. Indoor shoes will help keep our classroom cleaner as well as the hallways of the school and the gymnasium. Students will have snack time in the morning and afternoon, so please ensure to send healthy and hearty snacks to help fuel your child throughout the day. As a school rule, we ask that students do not bring any toys from home (for example, fidget spinners, playing cards etc). If your child would like to bring a ball to use during recess, please label it with his/her name and remind your son or daughter that the ball should only come out of his/her backpack for recess times.

Please ensure that your child is dressed appropriately for the weather each day. With the fall season approaching, it might be beneficial to dress your child in layers so that they can enjoy being outdoors during the cooler mornings and warmer afternoons.

Additionally, if you have any Kleenex tissue boxes that you would like to donate to our classroom, it would be greatly appreciated. We all know that as the weather starts to get cooler and temperatures fluctuate, cold and flu season will be upon us! Thank you in advance to any families who are able to donate a box of Kleenex.

COMMUNICATION:

As mentioned above, please use the agenda as a main form of communication between home and school. If at any point during the year you would like to set up a face-to-face meeting, please write a note in the agenda so that we can set up a scheduled day and time to meet at school. Unfortunately, I do not communicate via electronic messaging. Whenever necessary, you may call the school and ask to speak to me by phone (613-838-2466).

I look forward to getting settled into our new classroom routines and getting to know all the students!

Sincerely,


Mrs. Hoogenraad