Fall Break -- a godsend for my mental health sake

Fall Break began on Friday for the kids, but with the professional development I've been to, today was really the first day. Sleeping in was glorious and I felt ready to tackle some of the projects I've been meaning to get to. Some of these projects are a result of the professional development I've had in the last week and really had the chance to process some of the things that have been going on. I keep seeing this break as the opportunity to restart and jump start some of the things I haven't done as well as I've wanted to thus far.

I've finally taken some more pictures of my classroom to get ready for making my first donorschoose.org grant. My biggest goal moving forward, aside from the whole closing the achievement gap thing, is to get my kids excited about reading. I've spent the week trying to put together my literacy centers so that I can start guided reading.

My kids read at all different levels. Using Reading A to Z, my kids range from E to Q. What does that really mean? I have some kids that haven't quite reached first grade level and others that are practically on grade level. I love that my class includes the ELL kids on the grade level because they are so enthusiastic for the most part about learning, they just don't have the support at home. Sadly, several of my ELL kids are Nashville born and bred and 10 years later, they really don't have fully functioning knowledge in English and their working knowledge in the own language doesn't seem as though it's fully developed.

I have several stories I haven't had the chance to type up and that's my goal for break. Well, what's left of my working break. I'm giving myself an actual vacation and going back to college for a few days. I cannot wait. Many of my friends stayed around after graduation, I have a good number of friends still in undergrad, and one of my best friends will be in town from Chicago!!!

There are many times so far where I've thought that I had it better than I thought in college and I've had dreams where I'm back in school. I think going back will be odd, but at the same time, it will help me see how far I've come since graduation (aside from the scale that's told me I've lost 20 pounds since graduation)