Spring Break Shenanigans

One of the many perks of being a teacher is our wonderful, well deserved spring break. This year, my spring break is quite different than years past. It used to be all about me: sports, coaching, shopping, vacation, hanging out with friends, reading, and relaxing. The real deal. 

This year, spring break, just like my life, revolves around my one-year old son, Tyler. I am only half way through the week, and wow....words cannot express how thankful I am for the time I have with him and the love that continues to grow day by day. His innocence, passion, curiosity, and knowledge continue to amaze me, and I can truly say that I am enjoying every second of spring break: Every smile, cry, word, step, book, giggle, tantrum, and adventure we have together. It is also the real deal. 

My son's curiosity has been especially entertaining to watch, as he is always observing and learning from everything around him. While he can be instantly distracted from what he is doing, his innocence allows him to be genuinely curious about everything he sees, and in turn, he sincerely appreciates all of life's moments and is proud of himself when he completes a task independently. 

I find myself acting a little sillier, taking more chances, and enjoying more moments, as I am inspired by his energy and curiosity. I beam with pride as I watch him grow before my eyes and cannot imagine my life, or future spring breaks, without him. Being a mom is totally the real deal. 

#whatsup 

Ideas and Taking Action

My mind has been spinning with great ideas of how to improve my classroom. I am blessed with opportunities to attend conferences and collaborate with other talented, passionate educators, and these opportunities motivate me to take new steps in making my classroom student-centered. I recently joined a cohort for a Future Ready Teacher Leader Certificate through the EdTech Team. My excitement continues to grow each day as I continue to connect with more educators and learn from their experiences while also sharing my own. My mind continues to race with new ideas for my classroom, and I know it is up to me in order to take action and risks in the future. 

My first big step this year was revising my research project and turning it into an Inquiry project. While it took time, I am extremely happy with the process and my students' work. Will I do things differently next year? Yes...of course, but this will only make it more successful. The risk in changing the project was invigorating, and it provided an opportunity for my students to think creatively, analytically, and critically. They took ownership of their own research and writing, and this ownership was powerful to observe and facilitate. 

My next step is creating a Project Based Learning activity for our fourth and final unit. The unit focuses on aspirations and what it takes to pursue happiness. In addition, our anchor text is my all time favorite novel, The Great Gatsby. At this point, I am in the planning stages but look forward to creating a learning opportunity for my students in which they contemplate what it takes to attain happiness. The project will take place while we are reading, and each week I hope to give the students a day to research and share using some sort of digital platform. Google Collections is high on my list for a digital platform, as I have just started using it professional and personally in order to organize my ideas and share my learning. Potentially, students can research, question, reflect, create, and then post writing, links, images, questions, and videos in their collections. From there, they can share their reflections in our class Community, which will speak to a larger audience and provide an opportunity to learn and communicate with each another. I may also challenge my students to share their collections on Twitter or through another digital platform in order to expand their audience outside of our classroom. Obviously, the opportunities for learning are endless. 

Ideas will continue to come in...but it is my job to take action. Stay tuned as I continue to brainstorm, create, learn, reflect, and share throughout this process. #whatsup