Word study this week was unplanned.  Shh our secret! Rush out purchase this book!  I would have given a million dollars to have yesterday's mini lesson videotaped professionally.  First I shared the beautiful cover.  I passed it around the room.  Everyone touched it and felt the raised letters and could see the sparkle. Every learner was engaged in this book.  Every learner connected and shared their stories.  I now know where everyone hides t ..read more

My first week of lessons plans for word study were blown out of the water the first day of school.  When I begin each workshop with inquiry,  I should know better. After 31 years of teaching, you would think I would no not to plan a week out.  I found a new book (to me) this summer Word Builder  Once I read it, I knew it would be included in my Day 1 plans: sharing a great book and an open sort of vocabulary.  The power in an open word sort is that I learn along with my learners.  The conversations were huge!!  Actually so big I changed Thursday's plan ..read more

I'm celebrating NOT spending days setting up my classroom.  I'm looking forward to school starting next Wednesday and meeting my new group of learners. I am excited to share my reading life with my new readers. It's fun to xerox some of the covers of the books I read this summer. The minute my new students arrive they will know their teacher is a reader. I also include a few personal photos of my reading life and favorite places I like to read.  For years, I spent hours getting my library ready. Not anymore last year's class organized this library. Mixing all of the books up leav ..read more

It is a personal challenge to help my new wordsmiths flip their thinking about word work. I always ask how many of you enjoy ----- fill in the blank with different subjects. I record the data on the board, and we share observations about our new group of learners. I snapshot the data and keep it for future reference. Typically 5 out of 27 enjoy word study. I ask the hard question: Why? What does word study mean to you? How can I shift your perspective this year? I have several lessons already planned for the first few weeks of words study. 10 for 10 Picture Books to support word learning Map ..read more

Twitter is my summer PD! I learn so much from reading tweets and going down the rabbit holes of all the links. I want to spotlight Lindsay Barna (@litcoachmusings) for reminding me of my journey after reading her blog. I am the district lead for 3-5 Literacy team which means each building has one member that represents their school, and we meet several times a year. We focused on DIY Literacy, and I encouraged everyone to try one of the four new teaching tools. teaching charts demonstration notebooks micro-progressions bookmarks As the lead, it is my role to model, in order to model you ..read more

One of the three areas that I am committing to for my blog is sharing more of my reading life. This is so much easier in the summer when I read almost everyday and prepare for Newbery Club 2019 when school starts in August. It's quite the challenge to read as many possible winners and record my thinking in my reader's notebook. The pile on the left is my completed and on the right is my TBR pile. I take days off to read picture books which I will share in another Monday post. You know that feeling when you're finished with a book and you rate it 5/5 stars on Goodreads and then you read the ..read more

Their story that we need to unfold! I want to embrace my new students'name and honor their history. I am constantly shocked when I inquire: what do you know about your first and last name? There is silence in the classroom.... I notice unique names and take photos throughout the summer to share at the beginning of the school year. What a fun way for my students to learn about me and instantly they know that I embrace vocabulary. I found the image above on Twitter, and it grabbed me. I loved the idea of summer ABC photos and started thinking about a new visual "Get to Know You" acti ..read more

Me: "I enjoy reading blogs and learning from others." Friend: "Tell me more" Me: "I still want to learn, but I am not sure I have any new ideas to share." Friend: "Why don't you write about what you learn?" Me: Tell me more" Friend: "How about lifting up others and placing the spotlight on their tweets/blogs?" Me: "Brilliant" compliments of Google images This tweet spoke to me and said, "What a wonderful connection between readers and books!" I instantly was wishing I could have last year's readers back and have them write their index card. Ahh well, moving on to next year's class. I am ..read more

My blog has been quiet for a few months. The first several weeks I felt huge guilt.  As hours became days, days became weeks, weeks became months, I was able to release the guilt. I was always wondering did I have something to share on my blog?  The answers were consistently no. Thoughts would form, I would write them in my notebook, a few conversations would nag at me to be shared, or I would read something and be thankful that I was encouraged. It was more important that I left a comment to thank the author than write my own post.  I celebrate the gift of friendship. Those ..read more

Ahh state testing, anyone reading this blog understands what happens to the classroom environment during four weeks of testing.  2 math, 2 reading, 2 science and 2 MAP.  I am not celebrating that!  We had a state wide shut down on Wednesday with our state testing. All tests cancelled in the state of Ohio for the day. I had planned on two hours to complete the math test,  so what did we do when that happens?  Of course, more time to read, share books, play word games especially hangman and celebrate no testing.  10 years ago, probably 5 years ago, I would hav ..read more