For those of you who are new to my blog, welcome! Everyone else, welcome back! This year, I will be teaching 2nd-5th grade students in our program. This is a change for me but I look forward to working with your children and your families! I post a blog weekly--typically on Fridays, but sometimes it doesn't happen until later in the weekend. We also regularly add to the calendar (located on our homepage) and to other parts of our website as new information becomes available to us, so please, check in often! On my weekly blog, you will find information about what your child is learning in social skills as well as any other happenings at Lakewood and in our program. This year, children in my social skills groups will be participating in the "Joke of the Week", which means they will be learning, and hopefully telling you, a groan-worthy joke each week. They will be posted in the blog in case your child can't quite remember the punchline! :) This was a big hit with the kids last year and helped them in relating to, and starting conversations with their peers.
New this year is our Emotional Vocabulary Word of the Week! We will be learning a new feeling word each week and categorizing it under one of the four basic emotions: happy, sad, mad and scared. To help kids understand, I've created an "emotional vocabulary word wall" using a few of the characters from the movie "Inside Out" as visuals for the categories. It is my hope that through this process, children will learn to more accurately identify their feelings and share them with the people that care about them!
Thank you for being so supportive of your children and patient with us as we get everyone settled into a new year and collaborate with the staff at Lakewood to get our schedules up and running. The beginning of the year is always an exciting and exhausting time for me, as I try to transition kiddos and create a schedule that helps them maximize their time at school, not only academically, but also socially and emotionally. I know we will have a great year and I'm eagerly anticipating all of the growth the kids will make and the fun we'll have along the way! Thanks for entrusting us with your children and for partnering with us in their success! Have a wonderful weekend!