Great Start
I'm having fun getting to know my students. I have a lot of sweet, interesting personalities in both my classrooms, and am really going to enjoy working with them this year. Elm Grove is a special school, and I'm grateful to be a part of such a caring, professional environment. We are going to have a great year!
Homework
I appreciate the parents who contacted me about the log in confusion, this always happens when there are changes. I plan to use Google Classroom a lot to give assignments to my students.
There were a handful of students in each class that did not complete their homework, these students got to work on it in class on Friday while the rest of the class enjoyed "Ketchup and Pickles" (more about that later).
I realize that sometimes students get busy with afternoon activities which limits their time to do their homework, and that is why I let them work on it either before school (they are allowed into my classroom at 7:30) or during dismissal (we have ten minutes before I walk the bike riders outside). They are also allowed to work on it during class - although so far we have been pretty busy.
To me, it's not just about the homework, its also about students learning to prioritize and manage their time.
Final Note
I'll be grading some of my students' work this weekend, so I wanted to tell you about my expectations:
- I constantly remind students that a sentence needs to start with a capital letter and end with a period (I was surprised at how many of them still do not do this). I told them I would deduct points if they did not capitalize/punctuate.
- I tell them not to worry about spelling (yet), but that I expect they will spell words correctly if those words are found in the text. For example, if they read something about explorers then answer a question about explorers, I expect they will spell "explorers" correctly.
- If I cannot read their handwriting, they will have to redo the assignment (yes, it happened twice last week).
- Some of their homework may be graded.
