Welcome to first grade! My name is Mrs. Neely and I am very excited to be your child’s first grade teacher this year! I am looking forward to getting to know and work with all the children. We are going to have an amazing time this year. This is just the beginning of our communication all year long, but I wanted to take this opportunity to let you know a little bit about myself and a few important details for now.

To start, I am one of the fabulous first grade teachers here at Easterly Parkway! I was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York and moved to State College with my husband four years ago. I am a big city girl who loves to shop, cook, garden and spend time with my family. I have been teaching since 2015 and I am so excited to be teaching 1st grade again this year! (It is secretly my favorite grade to teach). We are SO fortunate to have Mrs. Radz with our class to support students as well this year! I’m sure that your learners will love and appreciate her as much as I do!

This year, your child will become even BETTER readers, become number experts, learn all sorts of new math goodness, and work on their author and illustrator skills in writing. We will also work on being respectful and responsible members of our class, school, and local community by practicing our SOAR expectations. As an inclusive classroom, we will also take time to explore our identities and learn about the identities of others to build empathy skills. We will also work on how to recognize our feelings and regulate our responses.

I look forward to meeting you at the ice cream social on Thursday, August 17th between 5:00pm-6:00pm! I am so excited to start a great year with your kiddos on Tuesday, August 22nd!

Sincerely, Mrs. Neely