Welcome

Greetings Third Grader!

My name is Mr. Longbotham and I will be your third grade teacher.  I hope this letter finds you well and enjoying your Summer.  I am so excited to meet you and welcome you to your new school- Lenape Elementary School!  

A little about me-  I’ve lived in and around New Paltz for almost 40 years now.  I came here in 1987 to go to college and fell in love with the area.  I grew up near Lake George in the Adirondack mountains and love to go back and visit that part of northern New York.  As nature is very important to me, I have spent a lot of time working with the Mohonk Preserve, Phillies Bridge Farm Project and now Open Space Institute as I volunteer to groom the ski trails at River to Ridge trail.  I’ve been busy this Summer working on building my workshop studio at home, reading, swimming, canoeing, playing disc golf and biking.  I LOVE to make things!  It might be building a shelf for the classroom, renovating a barn or fixing a door that needs a new handle.  I also love spending time with my wife Johanna and my sons Abe and Sam with his wife Sage and our new granddaughter Annie Summer Longbotham!  That’s right- I became a Grandpa on July 5th!  Johanna is a Massage Therapist and writer and Abe, who is 28, is working on his PHD in Math, while Sam is 29.  Sam is a Firefighter Paramedic and also a Para-rescuetrooper with the Air National Guard and Sage, his wife, is a Psychotherapist and they live with Annie in Vancouver, Washington.  We were lucky to fly out and meet Annie this Summer and get to know her a bit.  She is so curious and peaceful and is quickly growing! I am very proud of Abe and Sam and Sage as they are kind, creative, helpful and doing what they are passionate about.  

I am so looking forward to learning about YOU this year, as well as learning to do new things with you such as:  writing stories with you about our lives as well as making up stories, learning how to write in cursive (this is the name of our school- Lenape), designing a house that will survive a windstorm, reading lots of stories, creating some art, multiplying and dividing in Math as well as learning fractions with food, going on many interesting field trips in the area and learning about cultures around the world!  

And that is just the wee tip of the iceberg!  I’m SO excited to meet you in less than a month!

Be well,

Mr. Longbotham