Wow! It has been awhile!

I just noticed I had not posted a blog in a long time.  I looked at my blog drafts and noticed I had many started but never finished.  Nothing really felt right, nothing was really flowing. Then with the craziness of the end of the school year and the beginning of summer time just got away.  I am very happy to say that things have calmed down and I am enjoying watching all the World Cup matches and being lazy with my dog.
I ended the year trying out passion/inquiry projects.  I have to say I love them and yes I will be doing them more often!  The feedback from the students was amazing and their projects were amazing.  The imagination and passion of my students is beyond anything I could have dreamed.  Also said goodbye to my 8th graders in my Advisory. My 8th graders were my first 6th graders in my advisory and been with me for 3 years.  I don't think reality of them being gone will hit until that first day back.
Summer began with my niece graduating high school.  I met Madison when she was only 3 and a blond ball of energy.   I am so proud of her!

After the dust settled of the graduation excitement I went to work on my last chance to go to the Social Studies conference in Boston.  My awesome friend Lisa Glenn (@educatorlisa) nominated me for the Award for Global Understanding.  I am so grateful for her doing this and to Shawn Davids (@sdavids51), Mrs. Kim Quentin and Staci Vendetta for their letters of support.  My fingers are crossed (along with my toes, my shoelaces, my dogs toes!).

After Lisa hit the submit button on the nomination my relaxing summer began.  It was time to reflect.  That is when I noticed I stopped blogging. It wasn't a intentional, I thought about it every day but other things just got in way.  Now I have time to blog and reflect.  

Another thing I stopped doing was the 100 days of Happy.  Now this was intentional and I stopped before school ended.  I began to notice a few thing about doing the 100 days of happy, it really wasn't making me happy. Many people, especially those using Facebook for their 100's, made it more into a competition.  Who has the best happy moments?  I didn't like that, that wasn't the point. Then I started wondering "Am I missing happy moments by having my face in my phone posting my happy moments?" Irony!  Finally, some of my happy moments could not be photographed.  It might have been something a student whispered to me as they walked out the door, a post it on my desk, or just a simple smile.  My students were making me happy but due to privacy I couldn't post pictures of these moments. It was hard to take a happy moment and yell "Freeze I gotta take a pic and post this." When the photo was taken the picture didn't seem right or I didn't like how I looked but you can't redo the happy moment, it has passed.  I wanted to enjoy these moments, enjoy the people and keep my happy moments just that my happy moments. 

Over next few weeks I have a list of things I need to do for the summer.  One of them is blog my summer reflections.  So stay tune and follow for reflections on Teach Like a Pirate by Dave Burgess (@burgessdave), brainstorming on my AMLE presentations and beginning to plan for the beginning of the school year.  

A lot to do and a short amount to do it all!   But first some great soccer matches to watch!