Alphabet Fun

Remember how much my students and I loved E-Mergency! by Tom Lichtenheld and Ezra Fields-Meyer? (my review is here)

Well, I've got another pair of alphabet book that I'm betting stay off the shelf more than on, just like E-Mergency!.

A Call for a New Alphabet
by Jef Czekaj (Jef's website)
Charlesbridge, 2011
review copy provided by the publisher

First sentence on the front flap: "X is tired of being at the back of every alphabet book." There's the "major conflict" in the story.

First sentence on the back flap: "Jef Czekaj has a BA in linguistics." That explains just about everything else.

Because X is tired of being at the back of the alphabet, and because he thinks more words should begin with him, X starts a campaign to change both the order of the letters in the alphabet, and their roles there.

The night before the big vote, X has some strange dreams that make clear to him the hard work of the other consonants in the alphabet. He turns to the vowels for an easier job, but find that they, of all the letters, best understand that the letters of the alphabet have to work together, rather than in competition. Each has an important job to do.

The illustrations are filled with all kinds of alphabetic sight-gags that will keep readers busy thinking about letters and words and the crazy English language.

Al Pha's Bet
by Amy Krouse Rosenthal (Amy's website)
illustrated by Delphine Durand (Delphine's blog)
G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2011
review copy provided by the publisher

Al, the guy who lived back in history "when all sorts of things were being invented. Like fire. The wheel. Shadows." decides that he wants to invent the order for the newly invented set of twenty-six letters. He bets himself that he can win the King's contest to organize the letters with the most beautiful arrangement.

Al has quite amusing (and incredibly LOGICAL) reasons for the order of the letters. When he presents his order to the king, "The king said it out loud. The king tried singing it. The king wanted to sing it again. He said to Al, 'This time, won't you sing with me?' " (Groan.)

You can guess by the title -- Al won the bet he made with himself. And that's how the twenty-six letters have come to be known as the Al Pha Bet. (Groan.)

Poetry Friday in video and music

This makes me smile. I hope it does the same for you.

Is it poetry? I say YES! It's a list poem, illustrated with video images, and accompanied by music. Amy Krouse Rosenthal is the author and the music is by Elizabeth Mitchell.

I need to remember #5, #13 and #14 as a teacher, but I need to write #20 on the bathroom mirror so that every day I remember to slow down my crazy life just a little bit!

Lee Wind (I'm Here. I'm Queer. What the Hell do I read?) has the Poetry Friday roundup this week. Head on over to check out this week's poems.

There are six five four three NO slots open in the roundup schedule for the next few months (see sidebar). Would YOU like to host a Poetry Friday roundup? Stay tuned in June for a new call for hosts!

Ignite Presentations With 4th graders

Our 4th grade team is working on a 4th grade project around Making a Difference in the World.  We began this project last year and it was inspired by Amy Krouse Rosenthal.  The project combines social studies (citizenship, economics, etc.). literacy and art.  This year, we've changed a few things and added a few things.

Our 4th graders are busy creating products to be sold at our annual Art Show in March.  Students are using art time to create their own products that will be marketable to the audience. I can't wait to shop!  Last year, each child donated money earned to an individual cause--one that they cared about and had researched. We changed this a bit this year. Our entire 4th grade will be donating one cause for the money. But we wanted kids to know that money was not the only way to make a difference. We want the to understand there there are lots of ways to make a difference and raising awareness about an issue is one of them.

So, each child has been researching a cause that matters to them. These topics range from homelessness to distracted driving to foster care to pediatric cancer.  Kids have spent the last several weeks learning about these issues and collecting information using diigo (more on that at another time!).

This week, kids will begin to create IGNITE-type presentations to educate others about these important issues.  As a team, we decided on an IGNITE presentation for several reasons.  If you aren't familiar with IGNITE presentations, they are similar to Pecha Kucha sessions but in Ignite, presenters use 15 slides and each slide is up for 15 seconds.The Ignite tagline is "Enlighten us, but make it quick." I love that and it seems that there is a lot to learn when given these parameters.  This seems doable for 4th graders and it is an authentic genre.
We knew that this format would support our teaching goals--research, nonfiction writing, visuals to support message, etc.  We have noticed that although our students used keynote, the presentations are text, rather than visual driven. We knew that an assignment like this could really improve the way they thought about creating presentations of all kind.

One challenge was to find samples for the students. Since many of them were not familiar with Ignite presentations, we wanted them to spend time studying the craft of the format before they jumped in. Finding Ignite presentations (or PechaKucha) so students could get a feel for the type of work they would be doing was a challenge--many are geared to adults and not appropriate for children. However, we did find several that we used and the conversations around what was possible with these have been wonderful. One of my goals when it comes to digital writing is to collect great mentors for kids--pieces that writers can study as they think about their own decisions as writers. For this project, I found four very different presentations that have helped us think through decision making when creating this type of piece.  Each of these four slideshows is very different and each opens up different possibilities for our stuents.  The four we have focused on are:

Clowns Without Borders: Pecha Kucha


Why Blog? Ignite by Chris Lysy


Ignite: Jessica Harvey: My Beautiful Wheelchair



And, How and Why to Make Video Games by Peter Justeson


This week, students will begin their work on their Ignite presentations.  I am working on one myself and we've created some planning templates to help students move forward with these projects.

This page has 15 squares on 2 pages for students to think through and plan their presentation as a whole.

Each student will receive 15 of these half sheets for detailed work---visual, script, and notes.

I think that this project will help students learn a great deal as researchers and writers, but I think they will also learn a great deal about visuals, creating powerful presentations, and presentation skills that they will be able to carry with them no matter what they create in the future.

I'll keep you posted!

Books that Invite Conversations About Growth Mindset

Two professional books that have impacted my teaching in the last several years are Choice Words by Peter Johnston and Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck.  A recent post by Clare and Tammy at Assessment in Perspective reminded me how important this thinking has become in my day-to-day work with kids.   These books have been huge influences on the ways in which I talk to children and the awareness I have of their mindset about their learning.  I am amazed that even by age 8, many of our students seem to have a fixed mindset about learning and sometimes it takes lots of time to change that.  Some also have a narrow view of what it means to be a learner.   I think that no matter what our children's school and learning experiences, the messages they get from TV shows, books, etc. play on a very archaic idea of what it means to be a learner and what it means to be in school.

This year, I began our year by showing the kids Caine's Arcade.

I showed this at 9:30 a.m. on the first day of school to set the stage for the year.  Kids were glued to the clip and fascinated by Caine and his arcade.   I followed up the clip with a conversation about the reason I chose this clip. I told the kids that I thought Caine was an amazing learner and it was so evident in this piece.  Then we talked about all of the ways he was a learner and what it means to be a learner.  Since that first day of school, kids have asked to watch the Caine's Arcade clip again and many have watched it at home with families.  It was my favorite way ever to kick off a school year as I can already tell it will be an anchor for so much of our talk about what it means to be a learner.

Interestingly, this first conversation was amazing, but when we talked later in the week about classroom learning, their thoughts fell back to "It needs to be quiet," "We need to listen to the teacher," and "We shouldn't copy from other people."

So, I am in the process of collecting books that will continue the conversation about being a learner and growth mindset.  I am on the lookout for books that will help us to have conversations around this idea, not only during these first few weeks of school, but throughout the year. Often, I think that the books we share early in the year share our thoughts with students.  They come to know us through the books we share. But the community isn't strong enough early in the year for all students to bring their own thinking to the group yet.  So, it is important that this isn't only a beginning of the year conversation. I'm gathering those books I have and I'm looking for new books to add to my collection so that this conversation is ongoing.

Here are a few of the books I've collected so far:

I've always read The OK Book by Amy Krouse Rosenthal early in the year to talk about goals and the things we are still learning.

Someday by Eileen Spinelli is another favorite for this conversation.  In this story, a little girl sets out her long-term goals and then tells us what she is doing today to help her get there.

Today I Will: A Year of Quotes, Notes, and Promises to Myself is a great collection of quotes and notes by Eileen Spinelli. Many of these will be great conversation starters about agency, identity and learning.

Beautiful Oops! by Barney Saltzberg is a great little book that celebrates mistakes and reminds us that often, a mistake leads to something wonderful!

Thank You, Mr. Falker by Patricia Polacco is a book I've always loved but have never really thought about the message it gives kids about learning and growth mindset.

Walk On!: A Guide for Babies of All Ages by Marla Frazee is a book I've loved for years and one that I've often used when teaching kids how to discover themes in books. But it also has huge invitations for talking about learning and growing.

Everyone Can Learn to Ride a Bicycle by Chris Raschka is a new one that I am excited about. It is a simple story of learning to ride a bike. But the messages that everyone can learn and grow is a big one.

Picture Books 10-for-10: Fairness

Thank you to Cathy (@cathymere) at Reflect and Refine and Mandy (@mandyrobek) at Enjoy and Embrace Learning for inventing and now hosting the FIFTH annual Picture Book 10 for 10 event. It's always fun to see what books everyone chooses and how much we all spend!!

I've shared my beginning of the year favorite read-alouds for community building with so many teachers that it's time to find a new group of books to use! Thank you #pb10for10 for helping me find 10 titles that will get my students and me thinking about issues of fairness. I'm excited to have a mixture of contemporary fiction, historical fiction, folktales, music, and nonfiction. I'll supplement these books with poetry on the same theme.

I found this image without attribution on another blog. This will be our first "text" to "read" and discuss as we think about fairness and justice.

It's Not Fair!

 by Amy Krouse Rosenthal

illustrated by Tom Lichtenheld

This book will continue our discussions about fairness and equality.

Big Red Lollipop

by Rukhsana Khan

illustrated by Sophie Blackall

Sometimes we don't want to share, or take more responsibility 

because we are older.

But it's important to remember that what comes around, goes around.

Each Kindness (Jane Addams Award Book (Awards))
 by Jacqueline Woodson
illustrated by E.B. Lewis

This book will help us to connect fairness and empathy.
Hopefully we will never miss the chance to be kind
to someone in our world.

The Little Hummingbird
 by Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas

Is it fair that the hummingbird is doing all the work?

Tops & Bottoms (Caldecott Honor Book)
 by Janet Stevens

Is it okay to make a situation more fair by using trickery? 

The Red Hen
 by Rebecca Emberley
illustrated by Ed Emberley

If you've done all the work, is it fair to keep all the rewards for yourself?

Freedom Summer: Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Freedom Summer
 by Deborah Wiles

illustrated by Jerome Lagarrigue

With this book, we'll begin to connect fairness and Civil Rights. I'm hoping to read aloud the Kindle edition of Wiles' Revolution (The Sixties Trilogy)

Through My Eyes
 by Ruby Bridges

Is it fair for children of all race, color, ethnicity and religion to go to American public schools?

Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez and Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation
 by Duncan Tonatiuh

I'm a new fan of Duncan Tonatiuh after hearing him speak at the CLA Monday Workshop last year.
This book will broaden students' understanding of desegregation
to include the struggles of Hispanic families.

We Shall Overcome: The Story of a Song
 by Debbie Levy
illustrated by Vanessa Brantley-Newton

The story of this classic Civil Rights song will give us the "So What Now?" in this picture book unit. What will we do to work towards more fairness in our classroom, our building, our community, and our world?

Dublin Literacy Conference 2011

We LOVE the Dublin Literacy Conference. The conference is an annual one sponsored by Dublin City Schools (Ohio, not Ireland:-) and run by a committee of teachers. 2011 is our 22nd year and we host between 600 and 800 teachers each year. We have both been on the planning committee for as long as we can remember and the planning is almost as fun as the day itself. Most of our teachers come from around the Central Ohio area but we have been getting people from all over.  It is a great one-day event and we love it. It is a great day of learning and literacy.  If you are free and live close enough to drive, you should think about joining us!  (We have written lots about this conference over the last 5 years. You can read more in these posts.)

This year, the Dublin Literacy Conference will be held on Saturday, February 25.  It looks to be another great year and we are both so excited about our speakers. We typically host 4 featured professional authors and 4 featured children's authors. This year, the following speakers are part of our conference.  If you want to see more details, the printable program with registration information is on our district website. 

Professional Authors
Kelly Gallagher, author of READICIDE, DEEPER READING, TEACHING ADOLESCENT WRITERS and others.  Kelly will be our morning keynote. If you'd like to know more about his work, you can read a recent interview we did with him here.

Patrick Allen, author of CONFERRING: THE KEYSTONE OF THE READING WORKSHOP and PUT THINKING TO THE TEST will be another of our featured speakers.  Patrick also has an amazing blog about his teaching and learning life.

Troy Hicks' work focuses on the Digital Writing Workshop. His books (THE DIGITAL WRITING WORKSHOP and BECAUSE DIGITAL WRITING MATTERS) , blog posts, presentations and tweets have helped so many of us move forward in our thinking about this issue.

Christian Long is another speaker who has great insights into 21st Century Learning. His company Be Playful Designs focuses on school design and innovative environments.. He is a school planner, technology expert, and advocate for innovative communities and educators.

Children's Authors
Brian Pinkney is our afternoon keynote speaker.  His work includes so many powerful titles.  His newest book, written by Andrea Davis Pinkney is SIT-IN: HOW FOUR FRIENDS STOOD UP BY SITTING DOWN.

Loren Long is an Ohio author and illustrator that we love. We first met him when he visited Columbus on the TRUCKTOWN tour with Jon Scieszka.  We have since fallen in love with OTIS, DRUMMER BOY and most recently, President Obama's picture book OF THEE I SING.

Amy Krouse Rosenthal's work has been an inspiration to so many of us, especially her BECKONING THE LOVELY project. (If you have not watched the video, you must do it right now!). Her newest book is THE WONDER BOOK. Others include LITTLE HOOT, DUCK RABBIT, COOKIES: BITE SIZE LIFE LESSONS and BEDTIME FOR MOMMY.

Wendy Mass is another children's author that will be part of our conference. Her newest book CANDYMAKERS is quite fun and popular with middle grade/middle school children. As are all of her books. Those of you that read this blog may remember when I wanted to start a Wendy Mass fan club after reading JEREMY FINK AND THE MEANING OF LIFE. 

On top of our amazing list of featured speakers, we run about 20+ concurrent sessions two times during the conference.  These sessions are put on by Dublin teachers as well as others who submit proposals. If you are blog readers, you will recognize lots of people from our local bloggers' group on the program.

Local Bloggers 
Cathy Mere (REFLECT AND REFINE) and Katie DiCesare (CREATIVE LITERACY) will be talking about "Picture Book Possibilities: Using Literature to Collaborate with Learners.

Mary Lee Hahn  will share ideas for "Promoting Reading Engagement In and Out of School"

Scott Sibberson (SCOTT SIBBERSON) will present on "Web 2.0 Tools for Teachers".

Mandy Robek (ENJOY AND EMBRACE LEARNING) session is titled, "Something Old, Something New"

Julie Johnson (RAISING READERS AND WRITERS) and colleagues will present "Count on Communication: Weaving Writing and Conversation into Your Math Class".

Maria Caplan (TEACHING IN THE 21st CENTURY) will be presenting with her school's Technology Specialist on "Integrating iPods and Technology into Your Classroom".

Bill Prosser and Karen Terlecky (LITERATE LIVES) "The Best and the Brightest Books of 2010".

Tony Keefer (ATYCHIPHOBIA) "Crafting Digital Picture Books".

and I will be talking about  "How Can Technology Tools Impact the Reading Workshop".

Add these to the amazing Dublin teachers who are sharing their learning, how can it not be an amazing day of learning. I wish I could hear everybody!

On top of the great speakers, they'll be lots of great books for sale, time for lunch and chatting with colleagues, a Technology Playground and student work on display.    What a great way to spend a Saturday. It is one of our favorite days of the year! We hope you can join us.

2013 CLA/NCTE Notable Children's Books in the Language Arts

2013 Notable Children’s Books in the Language Arts

The charge of the seven-member national committee is to select thirty titles each year that best exemplify the criteria established for the Notables Award. Books considered for this annual list are works of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry written for children, grades K-8. The books must meet one or more of the following criteria:

• deal explicitly with language, such as plays on words, word origins, or the history of language;
• demonstrate uniqueness in the use of language or style;
• invite child response or participation. In addition, books are to:
• have an appealing format;
• be of enduring quality;
• meet generally accepted criteria of quality for the genre in which they are written.

43 Cemetery Road: the Phantom of the Post Office, by Kate Klise, illustrated by Sarah Klise, published by Houghton Mifflin.

A Leaf Can Be, by Laura Purdie Salas, illustrated by Violeta Dabija, published by Lerner.

and then it's spring, by Julie Fogliano, illustrated by Erin Stead, published by Macmillan.

Bear has a Story to Tell, by Philip Stead, illustrated by Erin Stead, published by Macmillan.

Book of Animal Poetry, edited by J. Patrick Lewis, published by National Geographic.

Cat Tale, by Michael Hall, published by HarperCollins.

Chopsticks, by Amy Krouse Rosenthal, illustrated by Scott Magoon, published by Disney/Hyperion.

Each Kindness, by Jacqueline Woodson, illustrated by E.B. Lewis, published by Penguin.

Encyclopedia of Me, by Karen Rivers, published by Scholastic.

 

Endangered, by Eliot Schrefer, published by Scholastic. 

 

Forgive Me, I Meant To Do It: False Apology Poems, by Gail Carson Levine, illustrated by Matthew Cordell, published by HarperCollins. 

Hades, Lord of the Dead, by George O'Connor, published by Macmillan.

His Name Was Raoul Wallenberg, by Louise Borden, published by Houghton Mifflin.

House Held Up by Trees, by Ted Kooser, illustrated by Jon Klassen, published by Candlewick. 

I Have the Right to be a Child, by Alain Serres, illustrated by Aurelia Fronty, published by Groundwood.

I Lay My Stitches Down, by Cynthia Grady, illustrated by Michele Wood, published by Eerdmans.

Lions of Little Rock, by Kristin Levine, published by Penguin.

Moonbird, by Phillip Hoose, published by Macmillan.

No Crystal Stair, by Vaunda Micheaux Nelson, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie, published by Lerner. 

Obstinate Pen, by Frank Dormer, published by Macmillan.

Sadie and Ratz, by Sonya Hartnett, illustrated by Ann James, published by Candlewick.

See You at Harry's, by Jo Knowles, published by Candlewick.

Snakes, by Nic Bishop, published by Scholastic. 

The One and Only Ivan, by Katherine Applegate, published by HarperCollins.

Unbeelievables, by Douglas Florian, published by Simon & Schuster. 

Unspoken, by Henry Cole, published by Scholastic.

 

Walking on Earth & Touching the Sky, by Lakota Youth at Red Cloud Indian School, illustrated by S.D. Nelson, published by Abrams.

Water Sings Blue, by Kate Coombs, illustrated by Meilo So, published by Chronicle.

Wonder, by R.J. Palacio, published by Random House.

Z is for Moose, by Kelly Bingham, illustrated by Paul Zelinsky, published by HarperCollins.

Tracy Smiles, Chair; Donalyn Miller, Patricia Bandre, Yoo Kyung Sung, Barbara Ward, Shanetia Clark, and Jean Schroeder.

2 New Picture Books

I picked up 2 new picture books today. First of all, I was THRILLED to see a new Bear book by Greg Foley. I am a huge fan of THANK YOU, BEAR and DON'T WORRY, BEAR. This new one is called GOOD LUCK BEAR and it is just as good as the others. I am working hard to help the primary students at my school find characters they love--characters they want to read about again and again. Bear is one of the characters they know. In this book, Bear finds a clover with three leaves. But his friend teaches him that a four-leaf clover means good luck. So, Bear goes off to find a four-leaf clover. His friends are not so supportive as he looks. The ending is a happy surprise just like we've come to expect from Foley. A great addition to this collection.

The other book that I bought was DUCK! RABBIT! by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Tom Lichtenheld. On the cover, there is a picture of a duck. Or is it a rabbit? Hmmm. It could be either and the book goes on to show you how. The book follows a kind of disagreement as to whether the drawing is that of a duck or that of a rabbit and each side of the disagreement tries to prove his point. This is one of those fun visuals that some people will see one way and others will see a different way. The author did a great job of turning the concept into a book for kids. I think kids will love the options and I can see lots of possibilities for talk and picture reading. A fun one to add to the library!

Little Hoot

Little Hoot
by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Jen Corace
Chronicle Books, 2008
review copy compliments of the publisher

Little Hoot is by the same pair who brought us Little Pea a few years ago. Little Pea was the poor vegetable who was forced to choke down candy for dinner so that he could get to the part of dinner he really wanted -- the big bowl of spinach for dessert.

Now we have Little Hoot, the owlet who is forced to stay up late and play, when all he wants is to go to bed at a reasonable hour like his friends. At one point he grumps to himself, "When I grow up, I'm going to let my kids go to bed as early as they want."

Maybe reverse psychology works, maybe it doesn't. There are no guarantees that this book will get your kid to bed. What it might do, however, is defuse a tense situation with its humor and all of the owl puns scattered throughout. Give it a try. Let us know how it works!

Planning for My Professional Learning 2010-11

I am so energized by all that I have been learning lately.  There are so many exciting opportunities for our students. I know that, for me, my own learning is key to the work I do with kids. Even though so much of my learning comes from reading blogs and finding resources on Twitter, I like to go to a few conferences every year.  I have always found it important to keep up with the thinking and learning through these kinds of events.  They all help keep me focused on the right work. There are so many opportunities for learning and I want to take advantage of those that I think will support my goals this year. There are so many great opportunities, it is always hard to decide on the most worthwhile and doable events. Luckily, most of these events take place on weekends. I have always thought it was well worth it to spend a few weekends dedicated to my own learning. I can also take a personal day or two each day to attend conferences if I need to.

I am taking another course via distance learning (University of Alberta's amazing program) toward a degree in Teacher-Librarianship.  My fall course focuses on Web 2.0 and it is right where my thinking is right now. Talking and thinking and learning with others on this topic will be great fun and I am hoping to figure out what all of this means for the elementary library.

On October 2, The Literacy Connection is sponsoring a daylong workshop with Christian Long on Designing a 21st Century Learning Environment.  This will be perfect timing for this thinking.  As you know if you read this blog, it was Christian Long who introduced me to The Third Teacher and I have had the opportunity to hear him talk at the Ohio Summit and at Dublin City Schools' Opening Day Convocation. He is grounded in his beliefs about kids and I am anxious to learn from him for a full day at this event.  Plus, I love the Literacy Connection events because I love having time to learn from and with this group of people.

Jennifer Branch of the University of Alberta told us about the 2010 SLJ Leadership Summit-The Future of Reading in Chicago this fall.  The speakers look amazing. There are a few of us from my district who will attend and I'll also get to meet the people I am taking classes with--face to face! I have already learned so much from my online course that it will be nice to get to meet "in real life". This summit looks to be packed with information and new learning, specific to school libraries.

Of course, my highlight of the fall is always NCTE's Annual Convention in November in Orlando.  It is always the place where I reconnect with others and learn from amazing educators each year.  I went to my first NCTE convention about 20 years ago and have been hooked ever since.  As a literacy educator, this is the place where the best thinking comes together and grows each year.  This year, I am looking forward to Thursday's sessions with Bud Hunt, Troy Hicks and Sara Kajder. I am also thrilled to be able to be part of the Elementary Section Get-Together in which Philippa Stratton will be honored. On Sunday, I'll be presenting with Mary Lee, Donalyn Miller, and Aimee Buckner.

I have been wanting to attend Educon at SLA for a few years . This year, I am planning to attending Educon 2.3 in January. I so appreciate that the bulk of this conference is over the weekend.  I have learned so much from the work of Chris Lehmann and all of the others who have been part of Educon that I am looking forward to hearing their latest thinking and in participating in this event. (If you have not heard Chris Lehman's TED talk or his graduation speech, they both give you a sense of what SLA is about.

In February, we will host the 22nd Dublin Literacy Conference. This year, professional speakers include Kelly Gallagher, Patrick Allen, Troy Hicks, and Christian Long. Children's authors include Brian Pinkney, Amy Krouse Rosenthal, Wendy Mass and Loren Long.  (Site for that will be coming soon.)

In April, I will have the opportunity to hear Debbie Miller in Columbus. Debbie will be the speaker at The Literacy Connection's yearlong study. We will begin the year in October and we will study Debbie's newest book,  Teaching With Intention. In April, Debbie will do demonstration teaching as well as a workshop for participants. This yearlong study is always a highlight.  Last year, Samantha Bennett was amazing and I am so looking forward to learning from Debbie Miller this year.

And, I would LOVE to attend November Learning/BLC 11 again next summer. BLC10 was the best learning I've had in a long time and I find myself reflecting on the speakers there often.  Alan November and his group put on such an amazing event.

So, my year is packed with great learning opportunities already. I am sure some new events will pop up as the year goes on, but I find that a monthly dose of great thinking and learning is perfect for me.  It helps focus my thinking a bit when working with students.