Nature's playground

As I approach the playground
I am both in awe
And afraid.
Anxiety ripples through me from its size.
I am amazed by its beauty.
The sun and shadow
Play peek a boo
Among the dips and waves of land.
The fog comes in
Without warning
To play.
Adventure (or danger) lurks
Around every curve.
Ice on every bridge.
I stay awhile...
Not sure of the way things will go
On the playground.
White knuckled
Until I have safely returned
To the plains
Of my home.

The Spreading of Spring

Traveling down 77 south today
I discovered
The journey of spring
Creeping from the coast
Toward home

The grass turning greener
Barren trees show tiny buds
The further south we go

Spring is well on her way
South Carolina her home today
I'll travel home
And wait for her there

Inappropriate Laughter

My family had been out to dinner at Max and Erma's.  We had a great time and we all joked around on the way to the car.  I couldn't have been that old... maybe 8.  My little brother was 4.  He was the cutest little kid!  He had REALLY big blonde hair (my mom could not bring herself to cut his curls), big blue eyes and this mole on his perfect white cheek, nose sprinkled with freckles.  He almost always wore soccer socks pulled up to his knees.
My mom always paid close attention to my brother and his whereabouts because he usually wasn't where he was supposed to be.  I don't know what happened, but I think she must have been distracted because after we all (or so we thought) got in the car and my dad started pulling away, I felt an emptiness in the seat next to me.  I looked over to see my brother, white knuckled, holding onto the seat of the car and the car door, legs moving so fast they looked like Flinstone feet!!!  His eyes were huge and I could see the fear on his face.  I wanted to tell my dad to stop, that Greg was not in the car and that he was running as fast as he could, holding on for dear life!  All I could do was...  LAUGH!!!!
I tapped my sister, who finally yelled, "DADDY!!!!!  GREG IS NOT IN THE CAR!!!!  STOP!!!!!!"  Thank goodness for my sister and her cool head!  My dad stopped the car.  My mom jumped out of the car, swooped Greg into her arms and our baby boy was safe.  :)

My baby brother Greg and my daughter Emma

Learning How to Teach Shared Reading

I want to point out that my entire post is underlined and I am not sure why.  There is absolutely no reason other than the fact that I couldn't make it stop.  :)  
When I first started teaching shared reading, I was very procedural.  I watched another teacher do it in a video and though, "Wow!  That is really cool!" and I started doing it in my classroom the very next day.  I had no idea of the power or the real purpose until much much later.  I realized how powerful it was after I learned about the literacy framework that my district uses.  Within the framework there are different levels of support.  Read aloud is the most supportive, then shared reading and finally guided reading and independent reading.I am a very visual person, so the image of the framework  really helped me to think about my teaching and the scaffolding of my students I needed to do.  I started to think about what my students need as readers.  I asked myself, "What do they have under control?  What can they almost do?  What do they need to learn next?"  I think of the framework as my toolbox, holding all of my valuable teaching tools.  I teach by using the teaching and learning model:  teach/model/demonstrate, prompt, praise, expect.  So, when I combine this with my toolbox, the teaching is very purposeful and powerful.  I don't just do things because they are cute anymore (well, maybe occasionally).  I use the tools that I have to move students forward.  Vygotsky and his Zone of Proximal Development has been a huge part of the way that I teach too.  He believes that we should teach in the zone.  That is when the child is able to do it with support.  Then you gradually release support as the child becomes ready, creating a new zone.  It's not just a theory to me.  It is my teaching life.  So...  on to shared reading.  When I think about what my students can do and what I want them to do next, I pick a shared reading piece very carefully.  If I can't find one, then I create one, using the book room books, poems or nonfiction pieces as my mentor text.  This isn't for sissies.  It's hard work, but it WORKS!  :)  Then I read the shared reading book and I think about my teaching point (as in guided reading).  I scaffold things like:  how to preview a book, how to use the pictures to understand the meaning, how to read dialogue, how to read punctuation, how to use nonfiction conventions to name a few.  I read the book with the children, often falling just a little behind so that I am not leading the reading, but participating.  When we find a tricky part, I stop when they stop.  I think, I ponder.  What are we going to do about the tricky part?  I prompt for what I have taught.  If I haven't taught it, I will teach it now.  When I teach guided reading, it is an opportunity to prompt the children as they practice what I have taught in shared reading.  Too much happens in guided reading sometimes.  Really it is supposed to be letting go of responsibility for the reading with support.  The children are to problem solve their own tricky words with prompting from the teacher because the teaching has already happened.  Shared reading is not too simple for older kids as well.  I can only imagine how things could have been different for Shakespeare and me if my teacher had engaged me in shared reading.  Left alone to swim in the words before me, I am pretty sure I nearly drowned.   

Powerful

I was a literacy coordinator for 13 years.  This meant that I taught, while planning professional development for the teachers in my building.  I also presented the professional development.  I really enjoyed it for the most part.  I was so excited to share my passion for teaching literacy with everyone around me.  :)
Teachers often tell me that they don't know how I know so much (and I most certainly don't know it all).  I usually feel uncomfortable because I don't want to stand apart from the group.  I actually want more than anything to melt into the group some days.  I want to be a part of things.  I have been thinking about how I do have so much information about reading and writing in my head all the time, just waiting to be tapped into.  It has been a process for sure.
As I am writing this, I am cringing because I worry that people will perceive that I am tooting my own horn here.  I am not.  Just reflecting on how I would answer people who ask the question if they had all the time I would need to answer it well.  :)  
It takes a lot for me to learn anything.  Nothing really comes easily and it really never has.  I started my journey in rural Ohio.  I loved teaching there.  I met a lot of great people and I had a lot of opportunities.  My first year I taught kindergarten and title reading.  I felt really good about what I was doing, but I will tell you right now that I didn't know anything about how to teach.  I knew how to present information, but not the explicit teaching I would later learn how to do.
In July before my second year, I got a call that said that there had been a reduction in force and that if I wanted to continue to work I had to go to Reading Recovery training.  I had just had my first child and I just wasn't sure, but after my husband told me that I either go or we'll be living on the street, I decided to give it a try.  I am so glad that I did!  Reading Recovery Training was the first powerful thing I did as an educator.  I had a lot of heavy reading to do (Becoming Literate) and I was so so tired, but I found the thinking behind the teaching absolutely brilliant!  I could see immediate results in some of my students and it was very exciting.  I remember loving when my teacher leader came because she would watch me teach and then talk about the teaching and learning in a very open and honest way.  It was NOT always good, but I always learned.
Then came Behind the Glass.  Oh my goodness I was terrified!  I had to teach my student on one side of the glass while the other teachers in my group watched and critiqued my teaching!  Ahhhh!!!!  I felt just sick!  Since I was in a rural district, I had to drive to another town for my class, so I drove my little student to the training center and taught her a lesson.  I think that she was as nervous as I was because she acted like she had never had a lesson in her entire life!  LOL  What made it worse was that I could hear the others talking about the lesson as I was teaching.
It all worked out in the end because the expectation was not perfection.  It was learning.  I wasn't supposed to know everything this first time behind the glass or ever for that matter.  I was supposed to be watched, coached and learn from the experience, which I did.  Teaching behind the glass was the most powerful experience I have ever had!
My close second was when I went to Ohio State for Literacy Collaborative coaching training.  This training was also very intense!  We had class all week, watched teachers teach, rip apart the lessons after we saw what the children did and then build them back up.  There was no room for ego or being self conscience.  The expectation was that you put yourself out there and be ready to be wrong about something.
I really believe that we need to let down our guards and really work together.  It's not a dinner party where you need to use your very best manners.  This is serious business and we really need to be open to growth for the little darlings in our rooms.
Coaching is interesting.  You really have to get to know the teachers that you work with.  You have to know how far they are willing to go at the end of the day.  It's rewarding when you have a teacher who opens up and says, "Work with me!  Let's kick butt!".
I challenge all of you (teachers) to do something that you are not really sure that you can do.  Look at your teaching through a new lense.  Make sure that you aren't doing things out of stubborness, or because you don't know how to do it differently.  There are so many resources out there.  Find a friend who wants to try something new.  Try, talk, watch, talk, change, shift, have fun!
So, if you want to know how to become more knowledgeable:

• Read professionally.
• Try new things.
• Have a buddy.
• Watch others teach.
• Have others watch you.
• Look at the data to see if what you are doing really works.  The kids will tell you through their work.  That is a guarentee!   If not, shift may need to happen.
• Make sure your students can do it alone and if not, back off.  You might be giving them too much support.
• NEVER take yourself too seriously and have some fun!

Ghost in the Graveyard

Oh how I loved to play ghost in the graveyard!  The neighborhood kids and I would make our plans to play while we were baking in the sun at the neighborhood pool.  We would all go home for dinner and baths and then we would meet on my front porch.
If you have never played, one person is the ghost and runs off to hide while the rest of the group waits on the porch and counts.  When the counting is done, everyone goes ghost hunting.  Whoever finds the ghost first gets to be it next.
We played night after night in the summer, interrupted only by a game of sardines or kick the can.  I love remembering this because I can actually conjure the feeling of the warm summer nights, crickets buzzing...  fireflies flashing.
One night, when we were all hunting for the ghost, we were having a particularly hard time finding him.  We looked in the trees, under bushes, EVERYWHERE!
Just when we thought that we were NEVER going to find him, a white image came around the corner of the house with an eerie sound....  "Whoooooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaa!  Whooooooooooaaaaaaaaa!"  You have never seen kids scatter and run faster!  I ran around to the front of the house and up the stairs, terrified!  I hid under my bed, listening to the rapid beating of my heart and my own hurried breath.  I waited and waited...  Suddenly I heard my mom's laughter coming down the hall.  She was not just laughing, she was crying, she was laughing so hard!
It was my MOM coming around that corner with a sheet over her head.  :)  After I recovered from the fear and then indignation that followed, my mom and I went hand in hand to the neighbors to assure the other children that our yard was in fact NOT haunted.

My Miracle Baby

Honestly, if you really think about everything that has to happen, every baby is a miracle baby.  My youngest, loves to hear the story of my pregnancy with her.  She asks me to tell it at least once a year.  :)  I call her my miracle baby because she almost didn't make it.  

I was about 7 weeks pregnant with Abbie when I found out that I was pregnant.  Tim (my husband) had decided that 2 kids was perfect.  We had a boy and a girl and he though that that was good enough.  Well, it was, but I always wanted a big family.  I just didn't feel done and I was struggling to accept it. 

 My mom and I were going to a friend's wedding and I thought that if I was going to drink champagne I wanted to make sure that I wasn't pregnant.  I drove to the drug store and bought 3 (overkill, I know...).  I did one and then the other and then the other and they were all POSITIVE!!!!  I was so excited that I ran outside to tell my neighbor Mark and locked myself out of my house!  The joy continued throughout my pregnancy, but the challenges were about to begin.  

One morning I woke up and felt like I had a bladder infection so I went to the urgent care.  They said that I was fine, but that my sugar was REALLY high.  I didn't have diabetes so I thought that was strange.  I told them that I was pregnant and they had me follow up with my doctor.  I had gestational diabetes at only 8 weeks along.  The doctor said that this was really early.  I could handle that.  I saw a dietician and went on a diabetic diet right away.  

Two days later, I woke up in the middle of the night with a pain under my right rib.  I thought it was gas, so I took a warm shower, drank some water, took a malox.  I was able to fall asleep after a few hours.  When I woke up, I felt a little better, but still had a gassy feeling.  This is not uncommon in pregnancy, so I went to work.  

I distinctly remember working away in my office when a very sharp pain hit.  I began to worry that it was the baby.  I tried to walk it off and it only got worse.  I was doubled over in pain and I called the doctor right away.  He was worried that it was an ectopic pregnancy, so he had me come in right away.  I had a very long drive around the interstate, but didn't want to wait for a ride or inconvenience anyone, so off I went.  I was sweating the whole drive from the pain.  I felt so afraid.  

When I got to the doctor's office, they ushered me to the ultrasound room right away.  The nurse handed me a gown and left the room.  It felt like any other routine visit.  Then she started the ultrasound and I started screaming.  It was so very painful I thought I was going to die.  I kept asking her about the baby.  She wouldn't answer me and only said, "Oh my God" and left the room.  The doctor came in right away and said that they needed to get me to the hospital for emergency surgery. I had a cyst in my body that was the size of a cantaloupe.  He couldn't tell where the cyst was attached and it was beginning to rupture.  He said that I could bleed to death if it did.  

My mind become painfully focused on the baby.  Will the baby make it through the surgery?  The doctor told me that no she wouldn't.  He said that he had to think about me.  I asked if there was a chance that it could stop.  My doctor decided to take a chance on me.  He agreed to wait on surgery if I spent some time in the hospital on the surgical floor in case it ruptured all the way.  I agreed.  Laying there for four long days was absolutely excruciating.  I couldn't eat in case they needed to rush me into surgery.  I just laid there worrying about losing my baby.  

I am so grateful to my Dr. because he was willing to take a chance.  He gave her the gift of time to get bigger and stronger before surgery.  He released me from the hospital after four days.  The agreement was that I would have the surgery when she was 18 weeks along because it was safer.  Whew!  He told me I had to have an ultrasound weekly, but I didn't care.  My baby had a chance!  

Eighteen weeks came quickly.  The doctor wanted to see me the Wednesday before my Friday surgery.  I went in and asked him how small it would have to have gotten to avoid surgery.  The Dr. told me 6 cm.  I asked him to do an ultrasound and he told me that he had been patient enough and that it was time to get this thing out.  I begged him to look.  When he did, the cyst was only 6 cm exactly!!! Praise God!!!  So many prayers had been answered in that moment!  

A few weeks later I had some routine blood work done.  The dr. called and told me that the baby could have Down's.  I thought to myself that it would be ok.  I will help my baby through any challenge, but I decided to have the level 2 ultrasound in case I needed to tell my  6 and 8 year old why their baby sister looked different.  Tim and I went through all of the genetic history questions and then we got to have a really good look at our baby.  They looked at her heart (all four chambers), and measured her arms, legs and head.  They told us that Abbie was really healthy.  

Two days later, my dr. called and said that my blood work was showing a potential for ovarian cancer.  He wanted to take the baby early and remove my cyst to do a biopsy.  I am a stubborn (or stupid) woman, so I refused.  Abbie's cocoon was going to remain intact and untouched.  No one was taking her early.  

When Abbie was born (a week early due to size from my diabetes), I had a complication.  This meant that I had to have my first c-section.  I was really scared, but so anxious to see my baby!  It actually turned out to be the best thing in the world!  My doctor took Abbie out and then he held my ovary in his hand with ZERO cyst in there.  

I believe three things happened.  I believe that God performed a miracle and took the cyst away, the doctor took a chance on me and saved my baby from being miscarried and I learned to let go and to count on God to do the best thing in my life, whether it was what I wanted or not.  AND I get to raise my sweet sweet Abigail which is the BEST part of all!!!!