I know that from the second I walk out of the classroom in June until the moment that tardy bell rings in August, my mind is running full speed with ways I can improve my craft. I am constantly looking for new lessons that will inspire the next generation of doctors and lawyers, bus drivers and stay at home moms.
As I sew and quilt, I'm thinking about what I could do to make each lesson run smoother or how I could have reached that child who just didn't seem to want to learn.
I go into my classroom at least twice a week over the summer under the guise of having to feed my fish (I have three fish tanks now) but always with the thought of wanting to do more, to be more, to achieve more.
I know there are teachers who are laughing and thinking that I'm crazy for doing all of this on my 'own time' but I find that I have many others who are just like me and who have the lifeblood teaching in our veins. We eat and breath and sleep teaching and can't wait for school to start again in the fall.
My friend and I spent a few hours again today working on getting our rooms ready. It's been a while since I spent time working on the walls. I was a first grade teacher long ago and used to spent countless hours putting up and taking down bulletin boards. Every month I would change them out depending on the theme we were studying. When I moved up to high school, I tried to keep up with changing the boards and between getting laughed at by the other teachers and trying to keep up with grading, I finally gave up on the decorating of the walls. I forgot how much fun it was decorating for back to school.
This year after spending a lot of time on Pinterest, I decided to attack the walls with a little color and some of my favorite sayings. I probably won't change them every month, but hopefully the words of encouragement will help the students and me have a welcoming place to come every day.
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