New Students and Open House

Tomorrow I will get to meet all of my new students.  I wish I had been able to call each of the families today, but there are only so many minutes in the day and making sure our classroom is ready for  learning has been my number one priority.  Well that and attending all of the meetings that have scheduled for teachers.  I am glad that I have had the chance to come in early and work on my room or I would have been really stressed with missing school on Monday due to the hurricane.  I must admit that I am also glad that power has been restored at my house and at the homes of most of my friends.  For all those who have not been lucky enough to get their power restored, I hope it is restored for you soon.

I know that we are going to have a fabulous school year together and that we will be able to grow together as the year goes on.  Please let me know right away if you have questions or concerns.

Professional Development and Hurricanes

I have been spending the last two days at a professional development conference.  I must say that for the first time ever at the start of a conference I was instructed about what to do should we have another earthquake.  I am glad to report that we did not have to evacuate for an earthquake.  I listened to the information that was presented to us and felt good knowing that our school is already doing almost all of the things they suggested.  I also was reminded how difficult it is to sit still for hours on end without moving and being actively involved in a the lesson.  I am looking forward to meeting with my grade level team and trying to implement some of the other things that was presented.  I know that if we work together as a team we can help our students to have an amazing school year.

After the conference, I joined almost every other person in the Fredericksburg and went to buy supplies and groceries for the hurricane that is expected to reach Virginia this weekend.  I am very hopeful that it is not as bad as they are predicting.  When Isabelle came several years ago we lost power for almost a week.  I don't want that to happen because I have too much school stuff to do this weekend.  With the earthquake earlier this week, I think we have had enough excitement.

Earthquake!!!!!

Today was a WILD day.  I went to school as planned and made tons of progress on my classroom.  I got to have a nice lunch with several members of my first grade team.  An EARTHQUAKE occurred this afternoon about 60 miles or so from our school.  I was standing in my room talking to a team member and an the room started shaking.  At first we thought it was workers on the roof and then I quickly noticed that my truck was parked outside my window was shaking violently.  We quickly moved to the doorway of the cubbie room and waited for the building to stop shaking.  Everyone is safe in my family and at school.  I hope everyone else is as lucky as we were.  I also think that in addition to all of our other drills we practice regularly we will need to add earthquake drills to the list.

Classroom Set-up

I spent most of today at KGES working on getting my room ready for students.  I have managed to get most of the boards done.  They need a few finishing touches, but are looking good.  I also got the peasure of meeting several of our new teachers that have just joined the KGES family.  Right now I am trying to get some of my calendar math stuff printed.  I know that it will be worth it in a few weeks when everything is at my fingertips and my classroom is filled with students who are eager to learn.  I hope to get some pictures taken as soon as I have everything put away and cleaned up.

Blogging and a Webpage

This school year I will attempt to keep up with my web page (www.mrsrichard.org) and my new blog.  I am hoping that I can quickly post things to the blog for parents to see right away and keep the web page for weekly updates.  I also hope to involve some students in writing entries on the blog as the year continues.  Wish us luck as Mrs. Richard and her class of Roses grows into a whole new direction onto the world wide web!