Everything was pretty much as I had left it, just in the completely wrong places. After assessing the situation, I decided to spend a few hours moving furniture, unpacking boxes, setting up my classroom library, etc. The usual. Here is how the room looked when I left:
It wasn't much, but it will make life so much easier when I return for teacher work week in a few days. A week that seems to have less and less time for teachers to "work" with each passing year.
While I was unpacking the ghosts of Christmas past in Room 303, one of my colleagues stopped in to see what was up. My response to her was, "Same old thing." This led to a discussion of how our lives as teachers mimic that of Bill Murray's character from the movie Groundhog Day, a movie about a weatherman who finds himself living the same day over and over again until he gets it right.
I realized that this will be my thirteenth year going through the back to school routine of preparing my classroom for a new group of students. Much of what I do during this process has become very Groundhog Day-ish. It comes as second nature. It is something I could do in my sleep.
Reflecting on this, I have decided to take the time this year to step back and reassess what I do in my classroom and why I do it. As teachers, we have the rare opportunity to hit the reset button on our career every September and try to do it better than the time before. While this continues to drive my wife crazy (she can't understand why I don't just keep my lesson plans from year to year), she has accepted the fact that, for me, teaching will never get easier. I will never teach the same lessons the same way I did the previous year. I will never be satisfied with how I did it last time. I will always look for ways to improve my teaching. The fact that the only thing I have purchased while on vacation is a new set of Rory's Story Cubes from my favorite kite shop (It's the Voyages edition. I am so excited to share it with my students!) to use in my writing literacy work station proves this point.
So, this is where the story begins. This blog will be as much for me as it will for those who choose to follow it. It will serve as an outlet to explain the reasoning behind the instructional decisions I make, document the student work resulting from these decisions, and reflect on the effectiveness (or ineffectiveness) of my instruction. It will serve as a means for me to share with you some of my favorite resources and teaching strategies that represent best practices in the field of education.
I can't wait to see how the story ends and I hope you will join me as each chapter unfolds.
Check this out if you are unfamiliar with Rory's Story Cubes. These are great because they can motivate even the most reluctant writer, be used for partner and small group writing, and provide you a fast and easy way to incorporate shared writing in your classroom.
Here is the link to Rory's Story Cubes for you to find out where you can buy a set near you.
http://www.storycubes.com/
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