This year we are excited to have many new friends in far away places. Sharing information
through letter writing to different parts of the world will make our school work more
meaningful, and take us on virtual field trips around the globe.

We will exchange travel mascots and their journals, letters, artwork, pictures and postcards.
We can't wait to hear from our new friends. We will be bringing the travel buddy mascots home
for overnight visits, and write and draw pictures of our time together. We will also be
building a bulletin board with the artifacts our friends send us.

We will have friends this year in Italy, Poland, France, Ireland and on the Zia Pueblo Indian
Reservation near Albuquerque, New Mexico. If you go to http://www.brindisiweb.com then scroll
down the menu on the left and click at the bottom on "English" you can explore the town where
our new first grade Italian friends live.

We've already received pictures of our friends in the Zia Pueblo. They have only 12 children in
their first grade classroom. We made a class book of their pictures which you can see if you
come to Back to School Night. Click on this website and learn about their reservation.
http://www.zia.com/home/Zia_Info.html

We are getting our packages ready to mail. We are writing a book to share to introduce
ourselves, as well. If you have something that your family would like to send in to include in
our packages, feel free to share. We are also in need of donations of postage to help pay for
mailing our packages. Dollar stamps can be purchased at the post office. We use stamps instead
of postage "tape," as our penpals enjoy examining and saving the stamps.

We hope you will continue to check our website and watch for photos and more information about
our new friends!