It was wonderful meeting with you all to talk about your children's learning and goals. I hope you all have a lovely break. Remember if you are going to your home country or another country and would be willing to bring back 1 or 2 fiction or non-fiction books in that language we would greatly appreciate it! Be sure to bring the receipt so we can reimburse you!
Dear Parents, As you may know, maintaining a high level of literacy in a student’s home language is the biggest predictor of academic success in their second language. Our school is trying to help support students’ home language literacy by increasing our supply of books in students’ home languages. However, since it is difficult to buy books in many languages here or online, we need your help! We are looking for parents who are travelling during the spring break and who would be willing to buy one or two children’s books in the language of the country you are visiting and we will reimburse you for the costs. These could be picture books or chapter books, for any age of elementary child. We would encourage you to have your child help to pick out a book or books that they would be interested in. If you would be willing and able to help us, please let your child’s EAL or homeroom teacher know and then an EAL teacher will contact you. Please do not just buy the books without confirming with an EAL teacher first, or we will not be able to reimburse you. We can only reimburse you for books with a receipt if we have filled out an order form beforehand. We very much appreciate your help if you are able. Related to their social studies unit on Governments, 5th grade EAL students have been reading biographies of two different leaders who have had major political effects, Thurgood Marshall and Barack Obama. They have been making connections between the lives of these two influential people and discussing cause and effect - how their actions affected others, and how the experiences of their early years affected their decisions and actions later in life. Students have been examining important academic vocabulary such as affect, effect, cause, experience, reason, and evidence through discussions of these biographies and by giving reasons and evidence for their opinions. 4th grade is working on their Medieval Times unit, and in EAL class we have been reading and writing non-fiction texts about Castles. Students collaborated to read about medieval castles and learned how to take notes while reading. Then they learned how to use their notes to write a summary of what they read. Come by our hallway to see our castle display in progress with students' summaries and captions about various important aspects of medieval castles. Dear Parents, Just a reminder that conferences are next week on Thursday. If you haven't yet signed up, please do, using the form that you were sent by email. Thank you and I look forward to seeing you and your children on Thursday. Here is a link for parents about preparing for parent-teacher conferences that you may find helpful. Best regards, Jane Valezy World Book Day is on Thursday, March 6th in the ES. We will celebrate books and the many languages of the world.
Your child is making a sign with ‘hello’ written in their home language. We will be meeting at 8:15 on Thursday morning in front of Mr.Richie’s desk to greet people as they come in. Feel free to join us, if you wish! (If your child arrives later on the bus, that's no problem - they can join us when they arrive.) Thank you! ES EAL Department |
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