Tomorrow starts the first official day of Teachers Write! 2015. It looks like I made it about a week last summer before life got in my way. I read the blogs and prompts all summer long, but after a week, my writing life stopped.
This summer, I'm inspired and hoping to to more by many people. Firstly, I'm inspired by my kids. Chelsea is starting third grade this fall, and she's been bringing home drafts and finished projects for two years. I'd love to say she's writing this summer. And she is. She's making lists and party invites. Maybe my writing will inspire her and be a model for her too. Katie starts kindergarten this fall. She can write her letters and copy. She will be writing this year too.
Secondly, I'm inspired by my students. I've been teaching ELA 9 for five years now and Reading Acceleration for three. I find it easy to share what I'm reading with my students and take suggestions from my students about what to read next. I'm less willing to share my writing, though. I'm only less willing to share my writing, because I don't regularly write, unless emails to parents and notes to my family count.
Thirdly, I'm inspired by the large community of writers who participate in and all the hosts and guest authors of Teachers Write and my professional learning community. This summer, our book club is reading, The Unstoppable Writing Teacher, by Colleen Cruz. This is truly a book for all teachers of writing K-12 and our group consists of teachers at each level. One of my greatest take-aways from the book is that we should write, write, write and model writing for our students by writing about ourselves at the age of our students. For me, this means high school. I've rummaged through my basement to find some artifacts that survived my elementary to college life. I'm hoping to read them, remember who I was, and focus on my high school self during Teachers Write this summer.
I'm excited to see where the next six weeks take me!
No comments:
Post a Comment