Thoughts for 2015/2016

First things first can I just get an AMEN on how beautiful Summer time is??? We have had an amazing break from school and even with the Arizona heat we have had a cooool time. Still have one more vacay to Utah before August. 

Disneyland and Huntington Beach

 Waterpark

Creekin up north and Fireworks (look how tan we all are)

Anyways back to work. I just wanted to share a little background on what I have been reflecting on lately for school going in to next year. I feel like when I post about it it gives me some accountability. 

For my masters class we had discussed how one way distinguished teachers are set apart is how they are not fixated on one magical approach to instruction. They search for new ideas and change their methods to meet the needs of their learners. They have a large toolbox of strategies and are comfortable interchanging and working on their instructional practices. I instantly thought of my mindset with stations. My first year I was fixated on perfecting the system and as soon as I felt it was perfect I wanted to change it more. At first I felt like I would be doing a disservice to my instruction if I keep changing things but now I feel like that is what will help me grow in my teaching and meet the needs of my ever changing classroom. 

This Summer I have been meeting with other teachers from my school working on our Gifted Endorsement. We were doing a book study on An Ethic of Excellence: Building a Culture of Craftsmanship with Students by Ron Berger. The book was.. eh but meeting with everyone and discussing the content really helped me hone in on some strategies I want to bring into my classroom more. I know classroom community,  real world/ project based learning, and more student led critique and discussion time are what I want to add to my brain while planning this Summer. 

I feel like last year my stations were really going in the direction I wanted. Then I went on maternity leave and when I returned it was like starting over. What I loved is that my students missed the stations and wanted them back! I did end of the year surveys and the 3 things mentioned most for good reasons were stations, the hw calendars (the sub did not use the calendars), and my Thanksgiving project. The not so positive things mentioned most were that I left for too long and that sometimes I yell (eek). So going in to Summer I knew these were the areas I wanted to focus on. 

Now that it is the middle of July the pressure is on (from myself...) to get working. I am also going to try and reflect more on this blog so I have a better reference to my ideas and how to develop them more. What are your Summer reflections and goals for next year?