Today, we give you back your child, the same child you confidently entrusted to our care last fall. We give them back pounds heavier, inches taller, months wiser, more responsible, and more mature than they were then. It has been our privilege and pleasure to watch their personality unfold day by day and marvel at this splendid miracle of development.
We give them back reluctantly, for having spent the year or years together in the small confines of our crowded classrooms, we have grown close, have become parts of each other, and we shall always retain a little of each other.
We have lived, loved, laughed, sang, played, studied, learned, and enriched our lives together this year. We wish it could carry on indefinitely, but we give them back we must. Treasure them, for they are precious.
Remember that we will always be interested in your child and their destiny, wherever they go, whatever they do, whoever they become. Their joys and sorrows, successes, and achievements we will always be happy to share, so stay in touch. Send us emails, surprise us with visits and hugs, invite us to graduation parties!
Thank you for your partnership with us, and for the extremely generous end of year gifts you have showered us with.
We will love your child forever.
Kim and Tom
SUMMER HOMEWORK:
- Parents, join our new closed group on Facebook: search Davis Seley BCS Team and click or scroll to Groups. Our teacher profile is named Davis Seley BCS and is a photo of us both. We'll post there a lot next year, and we've heard about all the cool things your families will be doing this summer and would love to keep in touch over the summer.
- Read every day, no matter what. A great goal is 30-60 minutes per day. Remember, reading ANYTHING counts. (chapter books, graphic novels, comic books, magazines, newspapers, recipe books, etc.) Go to the library!!! We recommend that you have a regular day of the week for your library visits. If you need help choosing a book, talk to the librarian or check out www.planetesme.com for more books than you could ever read in one summer! Use http://bookwizard.scholastic.com/ to find the reading level of books--the letter you know is called "guided reading" on this site. Use Compass Learning and MyOn :)
- Spend time with a learner's superpower, Compass Learning! Explore your math backpack and language arts backpack. These are loaded with activities that are at YOUR just-right level based on your spring NWEA/MAP test scores. In your math backpack, there are four domain activities: Operations and Algebraic Thinking, Number and Operations, Measurement and Data, Geometry. If you chose the domain with the lowest number score, it will help you to improve as a math learner. All activities in both your math and language arts backpacks are AWESOME for YOU! Do as many as you can! At some point, your CL backpacks will be automatically emptied for the next school year :( so we recommend that you take a screen shot or print screen ASAP of both your backpacks, that way, you can use the assignment search feature to find your recommended assignments, even if your backpack resets. Remember, that do CL on an ipad or iphone, download Puffin Academy (free) and run CL through Puffin Academy, not Safari. If you need help logging in, remember to use the link to the right on our blog, and your username is (like kad2), use your birthday password, Birmingham Covington School. (New students: you might have a log in from your other BPS school; if not, wait on CL until September; we can't look up you information at this time.)
- Practice math facts (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division) EVERY DAY for 15 minutes. Use www.xtramath.org Play free online games (check out our Wiki at http://bcs34.wikis.birmingham.k12.mi.us/Practice+Basic+Facts) and keep flashcards next to your seat in the car so you can practice EVERY time you’re riding.
- Write as much as you can. Consider keeping a journal this summer or writing on your Google Classroom account.
- Practice typing.
- Have playdates with kids from our class. Be sure to see incoming 3rd graders and our beloved friends who just became 5th graders!!
- Play outside as much as possible. Read outside. Wear sunscreen! Spend as little “screen time” as possible! (That means not more t.v. and video game time than outside time!)
- Be good to your parents, siblings, do chores to help out, and keep your room tidy.
- Do your summer packet!! Download the 3/4 summer packet at http://www.bcsonline.info/. The supply list is here as well.
- Join us when Mr. Seley plays at the Detroit Zoo's Wild Summer Nights on Wednesday, July 18th at 6:30 p.m. Mrs. Davis will be there with her family! Let's plan to sit on the lawn as a class! If you are facing the stage, we will be on the front right. More information at https://detroitzoo.org/events/zoo-events/wild-summer-nights/
- Spend the rest of the time wishing it was the first day of school!!!!!!!
