Your Days, Words and Thoughts

I was pleasantly surprised to see the rush of words come after I put out my first call for Days in a Sentence in about seven or eight weeks. The break was nice for me and I wondered if Days in a Sentence would still be on people’s radar screens. It surely was. And boy, folks can pack a lot of punch into just a few words.

Here, then, are this week’s Days in a Sentence, Six-Word-Style:

• My colleague, Gail P. (whom I ran into on the beach in Maine while we were both on vacation) teaches kindergarten at my school. Her year got off to a good start. It’s all working according to plan.
• Connie continues to innovate with energy and enthusiasm, with positive results. Successful with class redesign, I’m exhausted.
• Delaine also moves into new territory and then crops out the things she doesn’t want. If only life were like that. Surprise! I am effectively teaching PhotoShop.
• Liza is another one who found that some thoughtful planning is paying off. Routines are making a difference — Hurray!
• David‘s six words remind of a day in my class this week, when my sixth graders came in talking about the new supercollider, and asking if the world were soon to blow up. So I talked science with them and also talked Media Exposure, too. David writes: Hadrons, hadrons, hadrons: subsidized, overhyped, uncollided.
• Sara made the rounds, checking in with students and making connections. conferring with every kid is hard!
• This was great. My Writing Project friend and colleague, Tina (who ran a claymation camp with me this summer) already has some students tinkering with tech. Moviemaker and microphones made students ebullient.
• Stacey was thinking of country, perhaps as part of the 9-11 ceremonies. I’m proud to be an American.
• Ben is no longer on the same pins and needles, thanks to longevity and experience. Open house feels different when tenured.
• I wonder if Janice feels like she’s on the narrow end of a time funnel? Three weeks work, crammed into one!
• Bonnie had Barack on her Brain. Barack is back, and me too.
• Ken, the wonderfully creative Ken, gave us a six word poem:
  • Full sky, beckoning spring,promising rainbows.
• Sheryl has some sort of construction going on. I hope her foundation is strong. Technology helped me communicate with contractor.
• Jeff had the tables turned on him, with students becoming the teachers (although I wonder what words he learned?). Students taught me some Portuguese slang.
• OK. I admit I had to look up the last word of Lynn‘s submission. And then it made sense. My mind is overflowing with ephemera.
• Larry has both words and important lesson for all of us. First, his words: Raised my voice & a student cried. And now, his lesson that he wanted to share, too:
  Kevin, along with my six (sort of seven) words, I’d like to add a quote from Marvin Marshall, an extraordinary writer on classroom management, who wrote that before we act, we should always ask ourselves this question: “Will what I am about to do or say bring me closer or will it push me away farther from the person with whom I am communicating?” Needless to say, I didn’t do that in this instance.
• Anne continues to push into new terrain. Established new friends for online projects.
• Nancy experienced that frenzy of the week where it is gone before you know it. What did I do this week?
• From the mouths of the little ones comes this gem from Eric: Kindergartner asks me,
  Where are we?
• Amy K. had success by digging into the news. Literally. Newspaper number hunt messy and FUN!
• Cynthia is fighting off the Lovebugs (not Herbie!). Darn it! Lovebugs also survived Gustav. She explains: Those of us who live in the Gulf Coast states are cursed each September by an invasion of lovebugs, small black insects whose only purpose in life, as far as I can tell, is to procreate. They are nasty, disgusting, smelly, and invasive. They are supposed to be attracted to white houses. Someone forgot to point out to them that my log cabin is not white because I spent all Saturday morning vacuuming up these disgusting insects, but they just keep coming in.
• Gail W. is bringing some students into a meaningful project between the National Writing Project and Google regarding Letters to the President as the election in America gears up. Started 90 seniors on Google/NWP project:-)
• Nina is a decade old. Sort of. I’m celebrating the webheads’ tenth anniversary.

I could not resist taking our words and pushing them into Wordle and create this collaborative image:

Thanks to everyone who participated.

Peace (in brevity),
Kevin