Our third grade parents had a summer homework assignment this year. We asked them to share a welcome letter with their new third-graders.
Third grade is a pivotal time for students in their academic career. It is a time of growth, responsibility, meeting new expectations, and learning how to work through new, and sometimes challenging, situations. Every year is a partnership between students, parents, and teachers, but probably more so in third grade than any other.
I thought back to Coach Woods' blog on allowing our students to struggle and it made me remember that it takes a partnership to allow the struggle to be successful. There are times when we as teachers and as parents want to give the answers so we can move on to something else - but we deny our students the right to struggle when we do this.
To really make that struggle work we have to lay a foundation that instills in our students a sense of confidence, trust and faith that we believe in them - believe in them to struggle and to succeed. In hopes of really laying this foundation on solid ground this year, Mrs. Massey and I asked each parent to send a "Welcome to 3rd Grade" letter to his/her student.
We asked each of our parents to take the time this summer to think about what it meant for their child to begin their third grade journey. We asked them to let their student know just how much they loved them in writing. We know they say this a ton to them, but their is power in seeing it in writing. We also asked them to let their student know how proud they were of them, their excitement for all that was going to happen in third grade, and to let them know what their hopes and dreams were for them this year.
The thoughts our parents shared were amazingly powerful and heartfelt. There was laughter, lots of smiles, expressions of, "this is cool" and yes we even had tears over the things that parents shared with their students. We believe that this foundation has given our students the support and encouragement from their parents to succeed and even struggle confidently this year.
We asked the students to keep these letters in their homework binders, so that when they have those moments of struggle and uncertainty about all that we ask of them that they will be able to read those words from mom and dad! We are grateful to our parents for completing their homework and helping us to lay that foundation we know will help our third graders to rise up and meet all their challenges this year.
A PARTNERSHIP like none other - student, parent, and teacher - in third grade. A foundation like none other - that is laid on solid ground in third grade.
A year like none other - in third grade!!
