Thank you everyone for all of your patience and understanding. As you probably already know, I was not at school the last few days before winter break. Unfortunately due to some pregnancy complications, I am starting my maternity leave early. I have been in close contact with both Mrs. Grillo and Mrs. Poland. We will continue to move forward as planned. Our rigorous academic efforts will continue throughout the year. As always, I will be available via email any time. I wish everyone good luck and I am truly going to miss my classes while I am out. I will keep you posted when my little one decides to make his arrival.

It's getting to that time of year when we have many special events happening. Parkwood Heights PTA is holding their fist Santa Shop this year. This is an opportunity for students to buy small gifts. Our day to visit the Santa Shop is Tuesday. If a student is interested in buying something from the Santa Shop, they should bring in their money on Tuesday.
We are also planning on holiday party. It will be held on Wednesday, December 16 at 12:30. If anyone is interested in volunteering to help at the party, please send me an email. Winter break begin December 17 because of the weather day. Students come back January 4. Have a safe and happy holiday season.

We have been hard at work in Room 24. This week our main focus was on the Reading Skill Main Idea. We also had to finish polishing our narrative writing. We are now moving on to Report Writing. Most of the work we do for our reports will be completed in class. We may ask students to conduct some research at home with either the internet or a book from the public library.

Next week we have a short week due to Thanksgiving Break. There is no school on Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday.

Remember to get on to our 2 important web programs Destination Success and FCAT Explorer at least once each week. The Thanksgiving break is a great time for some extra practice.

We have been having a very busy few weeks in Room 24. On Friday we celebrated the finale of Red Ribbon week with a Flag Salute ceremony performed by our third grade students. The students presented the history of Red Ribbon Week and sang some songs to the theme of Say No to Drugs. We kicked off our Thanksgiving food drive with a canned goods collection on Friday. We will be collecting non-perishable food items from now until Thanksgiving. Please send in any food items that you can spare for our food drive.

On Friday Mrs. Rehm's homeroom class got to participate in carving a pumpkin to celebrate fall. The look on the students' faces was priceless when they stuck their hands in the pumpkin for the first time. I will be posting pictures soon.

This week we will begin daily rehearsals for our PTA program on November 11. We will be presenting the play Turkeys on Strike. We hope to see everyone at our program.

Mark your calendars for November

Early Release Day

The next early release day will be Wednesday, October 21, 2009. School will be dismissed at 1:45 p.m.

There will be no school for students on Monday, October 26, 2009. It is a Planning Day for teachers.