My commitment to you and your child is thus: 

• During the school year, I will work tirelessly in order to ensure your child’s success.  I will get to know your child as an individual and work hard at meeting his or her individual academic needs.  I will raise the bar and challenge your child to reach higher than ever before, so that he or she can reach his or her highest academic potential.   

• I will prepare your child well for the Connecticut Mastery Test, but not to the detriment of genuine learning.  I will not “worksheet” your child to death in an effort to prepare him or her for the test, but instead will teach your child to read, write, and become a competent mathematician, because every good reader, writer, and mathematician will do well on the CMT, whether he or she has seen sample problems from the test or not. 

• I will make learning fun for your child and create a classroom atmosphere that your child will look forward to coming to every day.  I will encourage your child to fall in love with reading and writing as I have, and will ensure that your child’s voice is celebrated as much as possible inside and outside the walls of Wolcott School.    

• I will encourage your child to become more independent.  I will encourage kindness, friendship, charity, teamwork, and a healthy spirit of competition in your child.  I will foster self-respect in your child as well as respect for others, but will also encourage your child to question authority when confronted with unfairness.

• I will not make homework the bane of your existence every evening.  Your child should be reading for pleasure for at least 30 minutes each night and will then have no more than 30 minutes of homework to complete.  After 30 minutes, I will encourage your child to stop, finished or not.  I strongly believe that your child should have ample time to be a child and play.  My homework policy to this letter, which will hopefully explain my philosophy more clearly. 

• I will ensure that the classroom is safe for your child and free of unnecessary disruptions.  Inappropriate behavior, including behavior that interferes with the learning of others, will not be tolerated.  My discipline policy will explain my philosophy more clearly. 

• I will keep you constantly informed about what is going on in the classroom, your child’s progress, and any concerns that I may have.  I will send home at least one newsletter a week and will be available to you in person or on the phone whenever you need me.  Newsletters are also posted here, so when your child loses the latest Shakespearean Sonnet in the bottom of his or her backpack, you can check the web and find the information there as well.   I am usually at school by 7AM on most days and hang around for about an hour after school lets out, so feel free to drop by before school starts or after school if you have anything you need to discuss.