Celebrate This Week and DigiLit Sunday

 

I'm combining my Celebrate This Week post with DigiLit Sunday today.  Thank you, Ruth Ayres and Margaret Simon, for providing these spaces for us!

Wow!  What a week it has been.  This has been the first full week back to school with students, and I'm loving it!  I get to teach my returning 6th graders again this year, and I met my new group of 5th graders.  So much to celebrate!

- I noticed that several of my 5th graders say "Thank you" before leaving class every day.  I'm so encouraged by that!

- Heart maps with 5th graders! 

- 6th graders excited about getting back to Kidblog!  Their first Slice of Life posts are due today.  I loved their excitement for getting back to writing, and I've enjoyed reading about their summers.

- I love that I get all my 6th graders for Round Table at the end of the day, and I love that they're happy about that, too!

- Our staff middle grade book club got together to talk about Peter Brown's The Wild Robot.  We all really enjoyed it and had a great discussion.  Our next book is going to be Ms. Bixby's Last Day.

- The press release from the Ohio Board of Education came out Friday to announce that I was the 2017 Teacher of the Year for Ohio State Board District 4.   Now we wait to see who the overall 2017 Ohio Teacher of the Year will be.  It should be announced soon.  The whole experience has been amazing.  I was nominated in May, so I filled out the application for the deadline at the end of the school year and found out I was a finalist in June.  Then I interviewed August 5th.  No matter what happens at this point, it's been quite a journey (with a few funny stories along the way which I may write about in the future), and I am so honored to represent District 4 and Kings Local Schools. The outpouring of support has been wonderful.  I am beyond blessed that I get to teach at such a wonderful place with great colleagues, administrators, families, and most of all, students. I love my job!

- Fun Friday night concert with my husband to see Mat Kearney and Needtobreathe.  It was SOOO hot, but we still had a great time!

- I continue to love waking up to amazing sunrises in our condo.  We love living here!  As an extra bonus, one of my best friends just moved into our neighborhood last week!!  We had fun enjoying wine and conversation at her condo last night.

- In addition to getting back to digital writing on Kidblog, my 6th graders wrote "Where I'm From" poems and will be creating Animoto videos to accompany their lines.  I did this with my students for the first time last year, and I loved how they turned out!

- I'm happy for both my daughters, Libby and Katie, because they have great things happening in their lives.  

- It's my mom and dad's 51st anniversary today, so I had a nice chat with them on the phone this afternoon.

I'm ready for a great week ahead, and I look forward to following Margaret's Twitter chat with Katherine Bomer this evening!  I read her new book about essays, The Journey is Everything this summer.  It challenged my thinking and provided lots of wonderful mentor texts and ideas for teaching essays.  Margaret Tweeted out the questions for tonight's chat...