Reality Storm

Hey, everybody! Hope everyone had a great weekend. It went awfully quickly.

Well, the first news this week is that I graded all of the Reading/Writing assessments that I posted about on Thursday. I was mostly very happy with the results. There are some that could be improved on, and luckily I have some parent volunteers coming in early this week who will be able to help out, as well as Mrs. Appelsies and Mrs. Johnson. But I have to say that overall, I was very pleased and even surprised by the quality of many of the responses.

I also will be handing back the summative tests from the previous theme chapter in Rigby Reads. It's been a long time since the kids took these, but I've been trying to work out just how much this should count for in the gradebook, and I didn't want to overdo it or under-do it either. I will put the final grade on them and hand them back tomorrow. I also want you to know that the next test is this Wednesday, but this isn't the kind of test you can really study for. We will be prepping them in class over the next couple days for this one as we wrap up Theme 3. If you do want to help them out at home a little bit, you can review things like interrogative, imperative, declarative, and exclamatory sentences, as well as asking them to explain, once again, what they've read after their daily reading time.

During this week, Miss Mellinger will be taking over the class fully as she enters the main phase of her student teaching. I will be on hand to help her out, but mostly trying to stay out of her way. I am going to be taking some small groups out as she takes reign over the classroom, and acting more like an aid than anything for the next six weeks or so. Please feel free to continue to contact me with any questions about anything, and I will be more than happy to get back with you regarding anything.

I will also be able now to pull out some small groups who are struggling in Math, and I've also talked with Mrs. Stemnock about team-teaching with her on a couple of lessons in her class.

It turns out I was wrong about one more thing: The Camp Tecumseh money is due tomorrow; it was not due on Friday, as I previously mentioned. I did tell a child last week who was worried that we are not going to keep anyone from going simply because their money and permission slip were late. We are just trying to be pro-active in getting everything taken care of as early on as possible.

Speaking of Camp T, is anyone going to the training this weekend? I was considering it if I have any other parents going up there. Make sure you contact me if you're planning to go this Saturday. For those of you on the fence, the training starts at 9:30am on Saturday morning at Camp Tecumseh. This will be your last chance for any training if you think you'd be willing to help out as an instructor.

One final FYI tonight: I will not be at school on Friday, because I am going to a science training workshop for the whole day. My aforementioned student teacher will be here, which makes my sub plans really easy! There will also be a substitute teacher on hand, as well as the more-than-capable hands of Mrs. Appelsies, Mrs. Summers, and Mrs. Johnson in and out of my classroom for the better chunk of the day. It feels great to leave the classroom to a bunch of experts.

As always, let me know if you have any questions or concerns. Have a great week!

Mr. Carter
Starting to think the Colts might pull this one off...