What to Include in Your Class Welcome Letter
If you’re a parent to a school-aged child, then you know the struggles of the first day of school paperwork.
After a long day, we sit down with our favorite drink, open the bulging brown envelope, and pull out the thick stack of papers the size of a law student’s dissertation. We are faced with a mountain of information and forms that have to be filled out before the next day.
I know the pain of parents, so in order to make life somewhat easier, I created a concise one-page welcome letter that contains everything parents need to know about the class and gathers all of the information I need from the parents.
What’s In My Welcome Letter
The Front
Bitmojis- I include several of my Bitmojis throughout the letter to make it engaging and help it stand out in the sea of paperwork parents and guardians receive on the first day of school. I added the Bitmoji Chrome extension so it’s easy to copy and paste into my letter.
2. Short personal letter from me. This is where I introduce myself and let them know how excited I am to teach their child. I think it’s a great way to set a positive tone for the year!
3. Google Classroom Code and Expectations. In this section I lay out that Google Classroom is the go-to spot for information. I outline everything that was completed for the day on the stream, so it’s imperative students and their adults check it when they are absent. I include the code so students can go ahead and add themselves to the class.
4. Materials needed. The only thing students need for my class is a 3-subject notebook and pens. Students can also choose to purchase the novels we read in class so they have a personal copy to use in class.
5. Remind Code. I use the Remind App to stay in touch with my students and guardians. If you don’t use it, I would highly suggest you check it out. I like it because I can send texts out about class announcements, assignments, and reminders. I have found students and adults are more likely to pay attention when it’s a text versus email.
6. QR code for my Amazon Wish List. Sometimes parents want to contribute to the classroom, so I make sure to put the code on my welcome letter to make it easy for them to do so. It doesn’t hurt to put it out there! To do this, just copy the QR code and paste into a code generator like QR Code Chimp. You will download and then pop the image into your letter.
The Back
7. Student information. I love this section because it gives me insight into how the parents and guardians view and support their child. I ask what they want me to know about their child, what motivates them, and how they would describe them.
8. Emails. I send a weekly email update about what we’re doing in class. Because students have unique situations and I want to make sure everyone involved stays in the communication loop, I ask for all of the email addresses they want to be on the list.
I also have a QR code for this that can be scanned and is connected to a Google Form.
To do this, you create the Google Form, copy the sharing link, and paste it into the QR Code Generator. The adults enter in their student’s name, class number, and all of the email addresses they want included on the email list.
If they do not want to enter digitally, they can choose to write in the email addresses on the form.
9. My email address. Most days I do not check the voicemails on my school phone until the end of the day, so I make sure adults know the best way to contact me and get a quick response is via email. I include a QR code here that when scanned automatically adds my email address and school phone number to their contact list on their phone! How awesome is that!?! I use QR Code Chimp to create the VCard QR code. As with the other QR codes, it’s free to create and download the Vcard!
Other notes about my Welcome Letter
I print each class in a different color so it stands out in the mountain of first day of school paperwork. This is the bright paper I use to ensure it doesn’t get lost. The different colors also make it easy to differentiate when I collect and file papers.
After I have them collected, I spend one or two planning periods reading through the responses and inputting all of the information into Google. I create a contact group for each class and enter in the email address. That way I can easily select the group when I want to send an email. It takes a little bit of time, but it’s well worth it to have all of the information organized and easily accessible. After receiving some concerning information about a student one evening, my principal called me and asked if I had contact information for the student because the information they had in the system was incorrect. In an instant, I was able to forward the email and best contact phone number, and the principal was able to get in touch with the adults.
I use Google Slides to create the welcome letter. I set the page setup to 8.5 x 11 and add text boxes and images as needed.
If you are an ELA Unlimited member, good news…
You can access the template for the welcome letter by clicking here! You just need to input your information.
If you’re like, “This is awesome!” and would like access to resources like this one, plus tons of other creative and engaging standards-based activities,
