Goodbye Room 125 and Mohegan School

This is my last post of the school year and as a teacher at Mohegan School.  It certainly has been an adventure!  We will culminate our year with our class party on Thursday with Happy Meals and other festivities.  I want to thank Aimee Cayer for coordinating our end of the year celebration.  I also want to thank Melissa Leone, Tammi Brown, and Laura Treonze for their help this past year with our holiday party.  To all parents who have supported our classroom by volunteering to chaperon or just by making sure your child got his/her homework done, read every night, and handed in those notices on time...thank you, too!

To all the parents who have been so supportive of me over the past couple of weeks, I cannot thank you enough or express how much your kind words mean to me.

June is always a bittersweet time for teachers.  Though we are so proud of our students' many accomplishments, it's still hard to say goodbye.  Having had to spend the last few months of the school year knowing that I would not be at Mohegan next year has made the process all the more difficult.  Nonetheless, your children have reminded me daily of why I do what I do.  They have made me laugh and smile as they have shared their wonderful personalities and thoughtful insights with me and their classmates. 

I will miss every single one of the wonderful, unique personalities who have enriched my life and taught me so much this year. Their energy, enthusiasm, and love of learning have made my job a complete joy. I want you to know from the bottom of my heart how much I love each child and how much each one of them has left a lasting imprint on me. I am so proud of them and I am honored to have been their teacher this year. This has not been the easiest last few weeks of school for me personally, but what has kept me smiling are all those “a-ha” moments when I see the light bulb go on and someone says something that just blows me out of the water and I say, “Oh, my gosh…you are only 6 and 7 years old!”

So to Elena, John, Jacob, Emma, Kaylee, Michael B, Michael K, Michael L, Madison, Joey, Graham, Angelina, Jason, Luke, Andy, Devin, Giovana, Audrey, Jules, Annabella, Tori, and Taylor...I love you and I will miss you next year!  You are all UNFORGETABLE!

Have a wonderful summer!

Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?

This week we begin a short study of "fractured fairy tales."  We will be comparing and contrasting some traditional fairy tales, folk tales, and fables with their "twisted" counterparts.  We begin with The Three Little Pigs and other variations on the story along with The True Story of the Three Pigs written from the prospective of the wolf.  As we work on this unit, we'll talk a lot about point of view and how different characters (or people) can view the same incident from different perspectives.

With our math units complete (everyone did an amazing job on our final post test), we will be working on reinforcing important concepts we've learned throughout the year through lots of fun games.  Last week, the boys challenged the girls to an addition and subtraction contest.  The catch?  Students had to answer the problems in sign language!

We wrapped up our poetry unit last week.  I typed up students' poems and they illustrated their work.  We have quite a classroom of poets!

Our end of the year party will take place on the 17th.  We will be having Happy Meals for our lunch.  Please indicate whether your child would like a cheeseburger, hamburger, or chicken nuggets as their main meal on the form that is going home.  Side choices are fries or apple slices.  Drink choices are milk (white or chocolate) or apple juice.  I have already explained to the children that there are no other substitutions allowed.

Please note that photo money is due immediately!  If you do not want your child's photo package, you must return it as soon as possible.

Next week Wednesday, Thursday and Friday are 1/2 days with Friday as the last day of school for students.

My last blog post will be Monday of next week!