Welcome 2016- 2017 School Year!!

High Ability Introduction

Hello and Welcome to our High Ability (HA) Blog!

This is where you can go weekly to get a peek into our classroom and see all the wonderful things your child/children are doing. I will send out a weekly email letting you know when the new blog entry is up and ready to read. I do my best to get it posted by Friday each week. You can access the blog through a link at the bottom of all my emails or through Brummitt’s homepage, under the classrooms link. This is my third year blogging and my third year here at Brummitt. I am so excited to start this year and begin this adventure with all your children.

I would like to take this opportunity to let you know a little about myself and the program.





My name is Amy Ott-Lutterman. Your child will know me as Mrs. Lutterman. I am very happy to be returning to Brummitt this year as the High Ability Instructor.


I grew up here in Indiana and graduated from La Porte High School. I moved to Chicago to complete college where I earned my undergrad degree in Television Production at Columbia College. Later, I received my Master’s Degree from Governors State University in Media Communications and Training. I worked at a university in Chicago for seven years. After I had children I decided to go back to complete the transition to teaching program at Indiana Wesleyan where I earned my elementary education teaching certificate. I completed my student teaching in Duneland at Jackson Elementary where I worked with the first grade.

I am married and have two sons. My oldest son Wolfgang is now in third grade at Jackson and my son Vladimir is in first grade at Jackson. This summer was all about learning and adventures. My children got the opportunity to attend the awesome Camp Invention. They had a blast and I would recommend it for any kids with lots of curiosity.  They also took swimming lessons again at the middle school where they had the best high school swimming instructors. I got to see a lot of my high ability students learning and practicing swimming while I watched my kids. They all did a great job this year.

 We also spent so much time this summer at the Michigan City Park Zoo. We love the zoo and the staff there is so friendly. The kids went to two weeks of zoo camp and we attended the zoo summer events.

  I love the zoo and all the staff. They are all great. The zoo is getting new lions this year.  We also had time to visit Chicago to go to the Lincoln Park Zoo. I would say it was a great day trip. They kids enjoyed learning about some different animals and seeing a few they hadn’t seen before.

This year we took a great family vacation to California where we got to see so many great places. We took time to visit with family and friends. We got to see so many places. The boys got to learn so much about animals, when we went to three zoos and the Monterey Aquarium.

Wolfe even got the opportunity to feed Butch the elephant who is a rescued retired circus elephant. I think the whole family loved every minute of our adventure.  We even visited the Golden Gate Bridge. Vlad wanted to visit Alcatraz, but we couldn’t fit that trip in. We did see it from the bridge though. 

This will be our third year using the High Ability Language Arts Curriculum Project developed by the Indiana Department of Education.  It's filled with many fantastic lessons which each fall under a theme for each grade.  We will use several of the trade and picture books suggested by the state as part of the curriculum.  The gifted lessons use the same models (Paul's Reasoning Model, Hamburger Model for Persuasive Writing, etc.) from year to year. So the added bonus is students who continue through the grades in High Ability will become quite efficient and familiar with the similar structures while analyzing literature.

I am very excited that this year we will be using a high ability based math series!!!  For the younger grades we'll be using Mentoring Young Mathematicians (M2).  The upper grades will use Mentoring Mathematical Minds (M3).  I briefly piloted it with my first graders and it was amazing!


It came with tubs and tubs of manipulatives to use during the lessons.  It even came with several dump trucks that we have yet to figure out which grade they go with.

I will be at Liberty Elementary next week preparing lessons and getting things in order. I will begin with students on Tuesday, September 6th. Permission slips will be going home today and Friday and need to be returned before your child may participate. I also sent home a sheet for you to fill out that will help me understand your child better. These are a great reference when I need that extra insight into a student.

Our start date will be after Labor Day which is Tuesday, September 6th for Language Arts and Wednesday, September 7th for math. The first week the students and I will be doing a lot of team building activities to get everybody comfortable with their classmates and me as their instructor. I will also post some pictures of your children working and showing their completed work from time to time.

Once classes begin, I will be at Brummitt Monday through Thursday. Monday’s and Tuesday’s are for Language Arts. Wednesday’s and Thursday’s are for Math. On Fridays I will go back to Liberty Elementary to meet with our High Ability team and make plans for the following week.

Please feel free to email me with any questions or concerns. If your child is new to my class, please stop me sometime and introduce yourself . . . I love to connect the faces to the students. I am looking forward to another excellent year here at Brummitt!

Sincerely, 
Mrs. Lutterman