The Sunrise Story

Thank you  Ruth  for this opportunity (and reminder) to  celebrate this blessing called life! The past couple of weeks saw much struggle. Snowy days and frigid temperatures did nothing to help, but I've experienced so much compassion lately, I am humbled.  Today I celebrate Georgia the cashier at Wegmans. She took a few minutes to chat with me. We connected on a deep & personal issue and she said to me, "I never thought I could be this happy with my life." It felt like permission to be happy no matter how life turns out. Thank you Georgia! (I'm also grateful for the kind man who offered to put my cart away after I emptied my groceries.) I celebrate YOU...my PLN...for each of you who took the time to offer words of comfort and encouragement. I'm humbled by your support and understanding during my last few blog posts. I felt seen and heard and loved. I leaned heavily on your sentiments and I thank God for each and every one of you! I celebr...

Thank you to Stacey, Betsy, Dana, Tara, Beth, & Anna for this amazing platform to write and share writing! What a wonderful community you've created! I'm honored to be part of it. Join us at  Two Writing Teachers .  "WRITE. I love to write, but writing is hard! It takes a lot of concentration and thought. It takes planning and creativity. I often write from the heart. I write about what I’m feeling, living, learning. I’m struggling right now because I do NOT want to write. Here. I am avoiding it. I haven’t posted in a week. I’m worried because in a few days the month long writing challenge, Slice of Life is beginning. I don’t want to do it. (Shhh! Don’t tell!!!!) I want to skip it. I avoid when things get uncomfortable. But, I can't avoid this. Writing exposes so much of me and what I’m feeling. How can I write and avoid that? I don’t think I can…but write I must. I am writing a lot in my notebook. I’m writing a lot for my book. I’m writing a lot to people...

Thank you to Stacey, Betsy, Dana, Tara, Beth, & Anna for this amazing platform to write and share writing! What a wonderful community you've created! I'm honored to be part of it. Join us at  Two Writing Teachers .  What do you do when you can't focus? (I feel like I need to borrow Holly 's OLW for a little bit.) Life is busy. I'm teaching amazing sixth graders...an extra class of them because we are overcrowded this year. I am teaching two graduate courses. I help facilitate the county wide twitter chat. I provide the cards for the card ministry at my church. I greet at church. I am on the steering committee for Run Me Home, which is an amazing race to support foster care in my county. I write for (and with) my students. I blog every week for these link ups: Slice of Life, Spiritual Journey, Celebration Saturday...and on really good weeks, Digital Literacy Sunday and Poetry Fridays. I'm also writing a novel in verse and planning a memoir piece of writin...

Thank you Ruth for this opportunity (and reminder) to celebrate this blessing of life! Valentine's Day when you are single is a tricky thing. I've had years where I've felt angry and cheated. I've had years when I ignored the holiday. This year, I'm single and I'm celebrating how much love is in my life! I'm surrounded by love and shown love by so many amazing people. That's the love I celebrate today! I celebrate the love shown to me by my friends.  The time spent talking and listening. The dinners out. The quick hugs and coffee chats. Life is busy and my friends are so important to me, so we often find any time we can to touch base and talk. My friends add so much to my life and I'm grateful for their love and laughter and the wisdom and joy they bring to my life! I celebrate the love from my family!  My family is everywhere!! Massachusetts. Texas. North Carolina. New York. Florida. We email and talk on the phone when we can. K...

Thank you to Holly for this place to share our  spiritual journeys! Join us at  Holly's blog . LOOK. What a beautifully active word! When I look up the definition, I find, "direct one's gaze toward someone..." I like LOOK better than the word "see", but they are linked. When I LOOK, my eyes, my heart, my soul needs to see what's in front of me...but I can't see it if I'm not LOOKing. It is something that I think about. The minute difference between those words. I'm reminded of the saying, "What you focus on expands." (Attributed to many different people) I think of it as, "What you're LOOKing for...you'll see." It's all about perspective and what you're paying attention to in the world. I'm paying attention to kindness, to love, to prayer, to miracles, to God. I see all of this...everyday...because I'm looking for it. Don't mistake me, life isn't rainbows and merry-go...

Thank you to Stacey, Betsy, Dana, Tara, Beth, & Anna for this amazing platform to write and share writing! What a wonderful community you've created! I'm honored to be part of it. Join us at  Two Writing Teachers .  Writing groups in the morning. Writing groups in the evening. Writing groups all around! Last week, the teachers in my graduate course experienced their first taste of writing groups. Sitting in the room while I listened to the laughing and sharing gave me goose bumps! It's such an honor to witness first time writing group writers! Today my students shared in their writing groups for the first time. We rehearsed using the "fishbowl" method. I used three students and gave them roles for our practice. One student was to play the role of the mean and rude commenter. The next was to gush over every syllable I wrote and finally the third was completely distracted and not paying a bit of attention. Our fishbowl got big laughs in each block! ...

Thank you Ruth for this opportunity (and reminder) to celebrate this blessing of life! I'm tired...but I celebrate this tired-ness because it means a life well-lived...at least a week well-lived!  Today I celebrate a full week of school. While I love a snow day like anyone, I appreciate the fact that being in a routine is better for me and for my students! I celebrate writing. We are working on independent pieces of writing and sharing them in writing groups. It's amazing to watch these sixth graders carefully craft their writing. Blogging three times a week has become a norm for them and writing another piece on top of that...WOW!  I celebrate read alouds that touch my students! I finished reading The Crossover the day it won the Newbery Award. Now my students and I are experiencing it together as a read aloud and really enjoying it! A novel in verse about middle school twins playing basketball?!?! Genius! We are soaking up every syllable of every poem! Speaking o...

Thank you to Holly for this place to share our  spiritual journeys! Join us at Holly's blog . REACH is Margaret's OLW for 2015. Reach. It's a word filled with potential, with possibility, with hope. REACH means still working towards something, still trying, not giving up! I like to think that those words describes my spiritual journey...possibility, hope, working towards being better...always working towards being better! Every time the word REACH popped into my head this week, I heard Gloria Estefan singing... a I love these opportunities to really reflect on the OLWs of others because it nudges me to really sit with a word....a word like REACH, a word used often, that I never truly contemplated. 

Last Wednesday afternoon after a very long day, I prepared to teach the first class of Writing and Learning Across the Curriculum. Nine years ago I took this writing course and now I'm teaching it for the third (or fourth) time. I keep thinking...What an honor! I'm so lucky! What an experience! Teachers from elementary, middle and high school levels come together for a few hours every week to write and share their writing. They take time from their busy lives to be here. I get to facilitate those hours and I take that responsibility seriously. Having done this before, I now know that I can't do this alone. They need to be IN it! These teachers are IN it!!! Every week I read and respond to reflections from them about their reading, writing, thoughts, etc. The reflections I've read this week amaze me. These teachers showed such honesty and drive in their goals for being here. Many expressed frustrations with lack of time and so many expressed a desire to be better...a bet...

February ’ s LCPS Twitter Chats This Month’s Topic: The 4 C’s and 21 st  Century Classroom What can you do to increase collaboration and communication in your classroom?   What are your biggest hurdles to encouraging problem solving?    Is creativity encouraged in your classroom?  How?  Join fellow LCPS educators as we examine and explore the ways to change what happens inside LCPS schools and classrooms. Have a cool activity or tip that you would like to share, be sure to check out the Twitter chat on  Februar y  5 th . Questions and Suggestions When : February 5 t h , 2015 at 8pm How:  Login to Twitter and simply search the hashtag #LCPSedchat Where : Via Twitter… So where ever you and your phone are. ;-) What : “ 4C’s and 21 st  Century Classroom ” Hashtag : #lcpsedchat Who : EVERYONE! ALL are welcome! This month’s Twitter chat will be moderated by @mhaseltine, @jbreynoldsTRT and @mikespeidel....

Thank you to Stacey, Betsy, Dana, Tara, Beth, & Anna for this amazing platform to write and share writing! What a wonderful community you've created! I'm honored to be part of it. Join us at Two Writing Teachers .  Today (written Monday, after school) we were having a discussion about how to talk about books. I want my students to have deeper conversations than "My favorite part is..." and "Did you like it?" We started with making a list of DOs and DON'Ts when Discussing Books. As I anticipated, "Don't spoil the ending!" was top of the DON'Ts list...but then the conversation took a surprising twist. One student blurted out, "Unless they want to know how it ends."   Confession time...I almost waved off her remark, but something made me stop and address it. I asked the class, "Who wants to know how a book ends before you start reading it?" Hands slowly started going up. They laughed. I'm sure my ...

Join us at Margaret's blog for digital literacy posts every Sunday! I am taking a picture everyday this year...at the same time everyday. I picked 5:22 each evening. I am documenting this on Instagram. I joined Instagram because of my students. I promised to post pictures when I am away at conferences. Instagram makes me happy. I like getting a glimpse into the lives of friends and family.  Today Holly created a video with pictures from Instagram . Video?!?! I didn't know you could do that! I found the app, Flipagram , and I started making my movie. I picked the pictures I wanted and then I got to add text and filters and music! While I was busy creating my very own movie, it occurred to me that my students could create movies using Instagram and Flipagram.  It's a digital way to tell a story! I am so excited to try this with my sixth graders! Thank you to Holly for introducing me to Flipagram and for Margaret for this link-up...which led me to put this ide...