We've Got Mail!

The other night I blogged about my whole writing a friendly letter activity and how I had hoped it would be successful. Well, it was a hit!

A few weeks ago I asked my families to write their child a letter and mail it to school in hopes to make this whole letter writing thing as authentic as possible. I only had 4 pumpkins who hadn't received a letter as of the weekend, so I quick wrote each of them a letter and put them in the mailbox. No one was absent today so I threw out my intended lesson plans and we spent the day with our letters. The kiddos LOVED receiving mail at school! And to see their faces as they opened their letters was priceless!

Before we opened our letters we talked all about them...we compared sizes, colors, shapes...we looked at the stamps, we talked about the address and return address (which they didn't even realize as their own address until they opened and read their letters and then it clicked)...we talked just about everything. One kiddo even received his letter in a plastic bag with an apology from the Post Office because his envelope and letter were ripped somewhere along their journey. The entire time we're learning, I was thinking...HOLY CANNOLI! I could make this idea into a pretty awesome unit! But we're on a time crunch people! Spring Break...3 days away and I've got a few cuties leaving a day early! :)

To watch and listen to my kiddos read their letters made me so proud. They've really come a long way since the beginning of the year. Only a few asked me to help with a word. They really cherished their letters and wanted to read them themselves. Once we read our letters we labeled the parts of their letter and the envelope. (I didn't take pictures of labeling the envelope for some reason but it's glued on the other side of the construction paper.)

I then let the kiddos write a letter back to the person who wrote them. Part of me wanted to really micro-manage this part and make sure every cutie included every detail and their letter was written perfectly...but then I decided to just let them go. (I didn't even proofread them...gasp!) We then addressed our envelopes, put a stamp on them and took them to the office where we put them in our little mailbox.

So worth it! Even when I kind of wanted to pull my hair out when we were addressing the envelopes! :)