My Family Portrait

October 14, 2022

Dear Florence Roche Families,

We had an unexpected end to our week.  Your flexibility and understanding is appreciated as we needed to make an adjustment to our dismissal today.  The health and well-being of our school community is a priority.  Dismissing students early and getting everyone out of the building gave our cleaners more time to deeply clean and disinfect classrooms and common areas.  They will continue this work throughout the weekend.  We hope that all of our students will be returning to school on Monday feeling healthy and ready to learn.  Dr. Chesson will be sending a detailed update to the GDRSD community later this evening.

On Tuesday, our teachers were engaged in professional learning.  In the morning, we reflected on all of our work during these first 6 weeks of school in support of the district values of acceptance, belonging, community, and district supports so that all students will achieve equitable learning outcomes.  It was interesting to hear how each level from preK-grade 12 is working to promote these values and support student learning.  Dr. Kim Parker, our keynote speaker, emphasized how important literacy development is in relation to equity for all students.  She shared a graphic that highlights the value of reading outside of school that I felt would be interesting for you to see.  Dr. Parker also made the point that whatever your child chooses to read can be a quality reading experience.  The most important thing is that they continue to read!

Here is one last reminder for our upcoming Early Literacy Night planned for next Thursday.  

Thursday, October 20, 2022

7:00 PM 

Zoom!

Please join us to learn more about how our whole community works together with our youngest students on emergent and early literacy skills. Those important skills, such as phonemic awareness, letter/sound knowledge, concepts of print, and oral language knowledge build the foundation that is needed to be a successful reader and writer beyond the early years. We will share how we work with learners at school in these areas. We will

also share some ideas for how to make literacy a part of your daily life at home. You will get a chance to hear from Amanda Densmore, the PreK-8 ELA Supervisor, as well as literacy specialists from both Swallow Union and Florence Roche. We look forward to seeing you!

Anyone is welcome to join us, but our focus will be literacy instruction in K-2. Interested PreK families are encouraged to join as well. 

The Scholastic Book Fair is coming during the week of 10/24.  Each class will visit the bookfair during their library special that week.  FloRo will celebrate literacy and the book fair on Friday, October 28th with a Dress as Your Favorite Book Character Day. Click on this link for more details.  Book Character Day! 

There is a Groton Public Library workshop coming up, this time with Rebekah Gienapp, author of "Raising Antiracist Kids: An Age by Age Guide for Parents of White Children."  

If you are interested in attending, please register with the link below.  If you would like more information about Rebekah Gienapp, please check out her website.

Registration: https://gpl.assabetinteractive.com/calendar/raising-anti-racist-kids-with-rebekah-geinapp/

Rebekah's website: https://www.rebekahgienapp.com/

I hope you all have a safe and healthy weekend.

Brian