Dear Families, We will be starting a story-telling project within our classroom over the next few weeks, called

chatterboxes. The common foundation underlying their development is to promote conversations, imagination, literacy, the love of reading and writing, extend a childs thinking, and to foster appropriate and positive parent involvement with young childrens learning. We will be working on engaging with text through retelling, creating meaning from the text through deep conversations, and extend our thinking beyond the text through tool building activities. The books that have been chosen for the children to read in their building of a chatterbox will address these topics: Paying it forward Bullying Racism Multiculturalism War

Please contact me if you have any concerns about the topics that will be discussed.

The Creation of Chatterboxes

The children will have the opportunity to create their own chatterbox in the next few weeks. Important Tips to Remember for Students and Parents when creating the box Maintenance and sustainability o Are the materials durable? Will consumable resources need to be replace? Appropriateness (developmentally and culturally) o Are you able to make connections to the whole child? o Is your box inclusive to all? o Are there opportunities to develop sensory awareness? Different materials such as paper, natural elements, fabric, clay, etc. Evaluation o How will you determine the boxs success?

o The children will be encouraged to evaluate the success of their chatterbox Extensions o Extended learning opportunities Dramatic play Writing Rich discussions Resources o Where will they gather resources? The suggestion will be made to the children that they can create their props or use beautiful things within their box instead of purchasing new materials or items. o Inventory list The children will be asked to include an inventory list in their bucket/box so that materials and props are not lost and are easily accounted for

Please know that we will be working on the creation of props and other items for the childrens chatterbox within classroom time. However, items may be asked to be provided, such as a box or bucket to hold the book and items that has a lid. This will allow all materials to stay in one place. Im looking forward to sharing in this experience with your child and am excited to see where this new learning takes us!

Mrs. Lynchuk