Sunday, March 2, 2014

I've Returned!

Source: http://i-a-t-g.tumblr.com

I believe Ray Bradbury states my current feelings best -- "We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled.  The trick is knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out."  It has been months since I've updated my personal or professional life for my readers.  Sorry!  When the holidays happened and varsity swimming took full swing, blogging (and cleaning my house) became the last things that would be accomplished in my already very full days.   Two weeks ago, we had fabulous end to our swim season with 9 swimmers at districts -- the most we've ever had!  My JV girls kicked butt at JV champs a month ago and it was a wonderful way to end a very eventful season.

Now that I've got more time on my hands, I am planning on returning to the blogging world.  These last two days (Friday and Saturday) I spent my time in Columbus at Ohio Council of Teachers of English Language Arts (OCTELA).   As I was sitting listening to the fabulous Tom Romano, he remind me of why I am passionate about this profession and of why I should write.  I leaned over to my grade-level bestie and said "I need to start blogging again."  So I'm back!  

At one of the luncheons this weekend, a teacher at my table said that she loves coming to OCTELA because she is refilled. Those profound words resonated with so many teachers in that room and they definitely rang true for me.  I left yesterday with so many ideas and a refilled passion to teach my kids! I also discovered that I love to learn about instructional strategies!  The Formative Assessment and Flipped classroom presentation we went to inspired my brain to think about so many possibilities in my classroom.  Jules and I also decided that we are going to combine our brains for a research unit and possibly do a lot of swapping kids during that time to ensure each kid is getting the instruction they need.   

Jules and I with our presentation starred! 

Jules and I also presented during the last breakout slot on differentiation.  We focused on a broad overview of differentiation and how we use standards based grading and differentiation to make sure our students grow in our learning.  As we discussed, we talked about the myths and facts of differentiation and in the end --talked for too long so we sent our activities home with the audience.


  


Overall, it showed me how much I love talking about the world of teaching and gave me a jumpstart on where I want my professional career to go.  I'm excited to go to school monday (as long as we don't have a snow day) and explain to them how I nerded out this weekend!   Keep your eyes open for some of the flipping classrooms and more that I learned about this weekend over the next few week!

How does professional development refill you?  What makes a professional development a good one? How do you show your kids that you still have a love for learning?

For a hilarious read on how professional development really should be - check out Love, Teach 's article If I ran professional development..

Best,

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