One Little Word: What's Yours?

in , , by Stephanie
As I connect with literacy teachers and leaders across the nation, I am inspired by the work being done by Cathy Mere and Julia Johnson within their school district. As part of their professional development efforts, they created a Google+ Discussion group to support teachers trying out new digital tools for within their classrooms. While I am not part of their district, they welcomed me into their group and once there, I found an amazing group of teachers who are sharing their efforts and supporting others in the process.

My first experience with the group is to articulate my ‘One Little Word’ to represent my intentions for the year using some sort of visual or digital tool. I enjoyed browsing the projects already posted and instantly knew what my word would be. Inspired by Margaret Simon and her ‘one little word’ Tagxedo using synonyms of her chosen word, I decided to do the same. 

So, here is my one little word project:



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Character Analysis Through Character X-Rays

in , , by Stephanie
My children definitely have a teacher for a mother and I love sharing stories about their school experiences and how they act those out at home. Last week, as I prepared to leave to teach a class at the University, I took out the large post-it note pad from the closet. My 7 year old was instantly intrigued and asked for a piece to “make something”. This kind of request is quite typical for my son who wants to write like Mo Willems when he grows up, so I happily gave him the piece and wondered what he would draw.

A few minutes later, I checked came back to view his creation and was quite surprised to find out that he did not create a drawing, but an anchor chart instead! Here is what I found:

Smiling, he told me how we meet characters in books and they all have traits that make them special. Since the chart paper reminded him of school, he wanted to make a “school chart” instead of a drawing. We talked about all of the traits he had listed and his twin sister joined the conversation, adding a few of her own. We talked about our favorite characters and our favorite traits and had a great conversation before leaving for school and work. What a proud Mom and teacher I was!

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