Reflecting on Reggio – A Series of Wonderings

Wondering #1 – How can I set the classroom up to honor participation and relationship?

I was fortunate to be a part of a Reggio Emilia Study Group with the Vancouver Reggio Association in March 2025. I filled a notebook with words, my brain with wonderings, and my heart with joy and a sense of what’s truly possible in education. It’s an experience like no other – a tapestry of professional growth and personal growth in one full week of joyful learning, connecting and collaborating. This is the first in a series of posts as I compile my reflections on my week at the Loris Malaguzzi International Centre, the schools and the community of Reggio Emilia, Italy.

“The environment should act as an aquarium which reflects the ideas, ethics, attitudes and culture of the people who live in it.” Loris Malaguzzi

As I look back at my notes from day 1 in Reggio Emilia, I’m left with more questions than answers. This happens often when immersed in the pedagogy of Reggio Emilia. A new school year is beginning and teachers have the privilege of setting up the classroom environment. This is at the top of my mind right now, so I share these wonderings with you, in hopes that it gives you a new way to think about setting up your classroom environment as I ponder setting up mine, with a goal of participation and relationship.

“Participation is the way to live in day-to-day relationship. Participation gives substance to rights. It is a way to achieve being a community.” Elena Maccaferri and Lisa Castronuovo, pedagogistas

What if we considered participation as a metaphor for relationship and learning? We participate to have fun and for joy. So how can we encourage participation in our classroom? Participation that children choose willingly and joyfully. I’m thinking of a new way to define “participation” – a definition that goes beyond doing what the teacher says. Rather, participation as a way of relationship and community.

What if we considered that the body is fundamental to learning? It’s where our sense of being in the world lies – with listening, feeling, being and becoming. How might this change our thinking as we plan the classroom space? For me, this means paying attention to the aesthetics. What senses are activated as I enter the classroom? What do children hear, smell, feel, see? What invitations are available for children as they explore the classroom? Can I invite children in to their space without having to say, “no, don’t touch, that’s for later, etc..”? Is it truly their classroom? Can they find cozy spaces with things familiar to them – such as family photos, favorite books from prior grades, stuffed animals of favorite characters, invitations to play with colorful and interesting objects? I want to fill my classroom with natural lighting or lamps, not the harsh overhead lighting. I will have larger areas for children to move and areas that are more compact, where children can make a tent or fit themselves into a smaller space. There will be a large group gathering area that is surrounded by shelves with our classroom library, so children feel like they are being hugged by favorite authors and the books we will love and learn with. I will have spaces to explore sensory materials, such as sand and water. I will have tables for children to work at, as well as spaces to stand and work or be on the floor. I don’t assign seats, as I believe that children can choose where they work best. This is something I will teach right away. Giving children control of as much as possible will help our classroom community come together and will give children a sense of agency and self-efficacy. I am continually asking myself what I can let go of controlling and hand over to the children. There are a surprising amount of things that teachers think we need to do that children are quite capable of doing! What might you give over to the children this year?

Do our classrooms honor children, who they are and who they are becoming? Do they honor the ideas, ethics, attitudes and cultures of the children and the teachers, as a community? I want to be sure my classroom is a blank page, so to speak, when children enter it. The walls are empty – with the exception of our linear calendar wall, family photos, our daily routines and a few select pieces of art that appeal to me and to children (Kandinsky, VanGogh, Picasso) or collaborative art from previous classes. The rest of the room will eventually be filled with children’s art and the tracks of their learning. I will have the fundamental space set up in a way that reflects what I know about young children and how they learn, but it will have many possibilities to be formed into a space that honors our community. The context is always evolving in response to what I observe and what the children tell me. Last year’s class loved blocks and our block area kept growing. The upcoming class might be the same, or they may need a larger art area. Time will tell. As I get to know them, we will negotiate the space to work for all of us. I want to be sure to keep my classroom clutter-free and well taken care of. I want to be sure that all materials I put out have a specific purpose and are taken care of. I model this and trust that children will take care of things. Children notice the “un-taken care of” in a space and it sends a message. When we take great care of our environments, the children will follow. Our environment is constantly transforming and evolving, as we follow the children and our community as it is being created.

“Care takes care and brings care.” Bellelli School teacher

What are your wonderings as a new school year approaches? How can you help make your environment an “aquarium”, reflecting the community of learners in the space this year?

Check back soon for the next post reflecting on Reggio.

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Fidelity…to what?

Fidelity.

A word that is used quite frequently in education and often connected to a particular program or curriculum. It’s one of those “nails on a chalkboard” words for me, as it’s tossed around so often without a lot of discussion or conversation regarding its meaning or what it looks like in classrooms with actual children. Let’s take a look at what fidelity means. According to Webster, fidelity is the quality or state of being faithful and accuracy in details. Because I am curious about words and what they mean, I read further.

Fidelity came to English by way of French in the 15th century, and can ultimately be traced back to the Latin fidēlis, meaning “faithful, loyal, trustworthy.” While fidelity was originally exclusively about loyalty, it has for centuries also been used to refer to accuracy, as in “questions about the fidelity of the translation.” (Webster’s Dictionary website)

I’m left with questions regarding teaching with fidelity. Who are we being faithful to? A curriculum or children? What details are we challenged to be accurate about? A curriculum or children?

While teachers do not take an oath to become a teacher, I’ve personally always believed in, “first, do no harm”. For me, this means questioning and reaching for understanding about the “why” behind my pedagogy and always putting the children in my care and their needs first. Combining years of research, learning, observation and knowledge and continually seeking new research and learning is what I’ve found supports and sustains me as a teacher and allows the children in our classroom to truly thrive. Paying close attention to the details within the children in our classroom and what their needs are is at the heart of my work. No two days are ever the same. Teachers must continually think and reflect on the curriculum and how children are learning. There is not a script for teaching young children.

Perhaps we need to rethink what we are teaching with fidelity. What are we faithful to? What if we were faithful to children? What if we put them first in our planning and interactions in the classroom? What if we used many tools and resources, all supported by research and best practices, to teach?

What if we taught with fidelity to children?

After I hit publish on this post, WordPress connected this post with one I wrote in 2017. As I reread those words, I wanted to reshare a portion here because it connects to this current post so well.

A teacher leader in my county once helped me reflect on the idea of fidelity vs. thoughtfulness. I keep coming back to that. Perhaps we need to be implementing new structures, programs, etc. with “thoughtfulness”, rather than “fidelity”. We need to look at the programs, curriculums and expectations our district and administration give us with a critical eye. We need to deconstruct these things together with our team, be thoughtful in our implementation, question and reflect on what works and what doesn’t. As one of my former principals always says, “the answer is in the room”. Talk, reflect and think together – don’t just blindly follow something from outside. We need to use the abundance of resources we have as departure points to launch our own best teaching. We need to keep talking, questioning and thinking with our team and on our own. As I’ve said before, we teach children, not curriculum, programs or standards.

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Dear thinkers, learners, wonderers…teachers,

This letter is for the teachers who are thinkers. Learners. Wonderers. Observers. Reflective practitioners. Teachers, in the most real and authentic definition of that term.

How are you doing?

I write this because I see the struggle. I see the frustration. I see the joy being sucked out of our profession. I see the joy being sucked out of our learners. I feel it as well. And I am concerned. Deeply concerned. I am concerned for what this means for teachers, for children, for families, for communities, for society, for the future.

Teaching and learning go hand in hand. As teachers, we must be life-long learners. We must always question, wonder and dig deeper to truly understand how we can meet the needs of our children and understand the “why” behind what we do. If our profession is relegated to following a scripted program and spending precious planning time reading a curriculum program and not learning, questioning, talking, looking at children’s brilliant thinking and designing research-based instruction that serves the learners in our classroom at this moment, then we have failed as a system.

We have a great opportunity right now to use current research on literacy learning (and much has been, and continues to be, published by literacy researchers), to stay abreast of literacy learning and combine this with how we know children learn, based on years of research in learning and education. There are understandings that will be replaced in light of current research, but some things are still supported by research and should not be replaced. We can use all that we’ve learned in our careers as educators to bring the very best instruction to our children each day. Veteran teachers can help new teachers understand how to learn and reflect as a teacher. But there needs to be time and opportunities for conversation and true learning. Not more trainings where you are told “you don’t even have to think” or that there “is no space for questions”. We need questions and thinking now, more than ever.

Learning is at the heart of what we do. Research gives us new things to practice and new approaches and considerations to incorporate into our teaching. Science helps us understand the “why” behind what we do and helps us learn better and stronger ways to reach the children we teach. But research and science MUST be paired with deep thinking and talk about our methodology and our pedagogy and must always be connected with the learners in our classrooms and the teachers. There is no one-size-fits-all curriculum, as much as some might hope for this. Teaching is a science, AND an art. And when the agency and trust of teachers is taken away and replaced with a program to be followed verbatim, written by publishers who do not know the teachers or children, then we have big problems. When teachers are told to follow a written script with no conversation, reflection, understanding or learning as an educator trusted to teach the children, it will not be sustainable and will result in a serious lack of learning, joy for learning and longevity in the teaching profession. We need to bring back the learning to our profession.

Teachers, I see you. I hear you. And I’m with you. Please find a way to take care of yourself and fuel your learning minds and hearts. You, and the children you teach, deserve that.

With love and hope,

Katie

Please feel free to comment, vent, share your feelings, share your hopes, share how you are sustaining yourself in this profession…anything that can help you in this magical, and so very hard, job we do. I truly do want to know how you are. We need to take care of each other. You are not alone.

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Fidelity vs. Thoughtfulness

We live in a time right now when professional resources are abundant. We have endless access to lesson plans, problem based learning projects, activities, ideas, blog posts, professional books, teachers sharing with teachers, curriculum guides, programs, etc… I can Google any topic and find a wealth of resources. Teachers are not at a loss for what to teach and ideas for how to teach it. But there’s something that I keep coming back to:

Are we being thoughtful with what and how we teach?

There are now scripts written out for literacy workshops, charts to copy or simply post, literacy “cookbooks” of sorts with specific lessons for exactly what your students might need and other resources to make our lives easier and to save time. These are good things, for the most part. Don’t get me wrong. They are based in research, carefully thought out by expert educators who know how kids learn best, tested in real classrooms with real kids. I own most of these resources and use them as I plan – (as a resource, not as a script). And these are WAY better than any basal textbook series I’ve ever seen. These resources have definitely lifted the quality of literacy instruction in many schools. They’ve provided a scaffold for implementing literacy workshops.

But are we thinking deeply about the kids we are teaching?

Years ago while teaching in Florida I was at a required basal textbook training for a series my county had just adopted. The representative said, “Look! Everything is written out for you. Even the teachable moments. You don’t even have to think!” And that’s when I walked out of the meeting. I didn’t go into teaching to not think. And I value my profession way more than to accept the idea that it would be a good thing if I didn’t have to think. It’s offensive and degrading to be told you don’t have to think.

It’s easy to flip open a book and have your lesson plan written out for you and ready to go. And chances are, with many of these resources, you would be teaching a good lesson. We get ideas from each other – that’s what teachers do. We don’t have to constantly recreate the wheel. But I hope that we are still thinking. And reflecting. And connecting with OUR kids – the ones sitting with us in our classrooms at this very moment. I hope we are not taking exactly what’s handed to us and teaching it blindly because we were told to “teach with fidelity”. We need to think and question. We need to teach our kids to think and question. We need to continue learning as teachers and understand the WHY behind what we are doing. We need to be responsive and reflective as teachers.

A teacher leader in my county once helped me reflect on the idea of fidelity vs. thoughtfulness. I keep coming back to that. Perhaps we need to be implementing new structures, programs, etc. with “thoughtfulness”, rather than “fidelity”. We need to look at the programs, curriculums and expectations our district and administration give us with a critical eye. We need to be very careful with resources we find online. We need to tweak the “recipes” in these literacy “cookbooks” to meet the needs of our students. We need to use the pre-printed anchor charts as a temporary scaffold for us as teachers – and replace them with kid pictures and drawings and our own students’ words as soon as we feel solid in that teaching. We need to deconstruct these things together with our team, be thoughtful in our implementation, question and reflect on what works and what doesn’t. As one of my former principals always says, “the answer is in the room”. Talk, reflect and think together – don’t just blindly follow something from outside. We need to use the abundance of resources we have as departure points to launch our own best teaching. We need to keep talking, questioning and thinking with our team and on our own. As I’ve said before, we teach children, not curriculum, programs or standards.

Be thoughtful. Question. Be willing to change your thinking. And as Lucy Calkins once wrote in my copy of The Art of Teaching Writing,

“Be a brave learner. Be brave enough to outgrow your own best teaching.”

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Teaching Students, Not the Curriculum

Thanks to Heather for sharing this timely quote!

I often say, “I teach children – not the curriculum, program or standard”. I can’t remember where I first heard this statement, but I love it and I truly believe this. My children – the ones I’m teaching RIGHT NOW – are first and foremost in my mind as I plan, set up invitations and provocations and determine the next steps in my instruction. I use a wide variety of resources provided by the state, my county, my school, my colleagues and my own professional library – but I believe they are resources, not a prescribed script to follow. My plans are constantly changing and evolving, in response to the five and six year olds in my classroom. This doesn’t mean that I wing it. Not at all! I spend a lot of time planning the framework of our day, looking at individual students and where they are in their ZPD and making instructional decisions based on my research, beliefs and philosophy of how children learn. But I don’t consider myself a “Responsive Classroom” teacher or a “Units of Study” teacher. You will see much of the philosophy of Responsive Classroom because I believe in a constructivist approach and that the social curriculum is at the heart of what we do; you will see a balanced literacy approach and you will see Writer’s Workshop and Reader’s Workshop because I believe (and have believed and taught this way for 24 years) in a framework of time, choice and response. But within that framework, every year looks a little different – based on the kids in our room that year. It’s kind of like building a house. The framework stays the same on most houses, but what’s inside is different depending on who lives there. The framework of my teaching is the same – a workshop approach, balanced literacy approach, constructivist, inquiry-based learning – but the details of how it looks each year is different, based on who lives in our classroom that year.

I worry that in today’s climate of one-size-fits-all instruction, with increasing kits, units and books that pre-plan lessons down to the minute being hailed as the “answer” to educational problems, that teachers aren’t being challenged to think. Are we reading the script or lesson that another teacher used with her kids, blindly following what “the experts” say to do?

Or are we reading the lessons carefully, reflecting on how it will work in our classroom, with our students, discussing and collaborating with colleagues about the lessons, and then planning a lesson that we own, along with our current students? I hope we are. I hope we are trusting ourselves and supporting each other. And I hope our schools are providing the time and support for all teachers, and especially our new teachers, to think deeply about instruction.

We can’t stop thinking, reflecting, questioning and challenging our own best teaching – and the resources we use. And we can’t forget that we teach children – not a curriculum.

A project coming to life in Writer’s Workshop.

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Leveled Books – Questioning our Practice

Do your students know their reading level? Why? Why not?

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about leveled texts and their purpose and place in the classroom. Thanks to Irene Fountas and Gay Su Pinnell for designing a text gradient based on Reading Recovery levels, teachers have strong support and guidance when they are matching books to readers. But the level of text is only one thing we can use as a resource when making decisions. We also need to know about the child’s interests, strengths and weaknesses, what strategic actions they are using, how they are constructing a reading processing system, etc… But I am concerned how these levels are being used in classrooms across the country. Fountas and Pinnell intended for levels to be used by teachers, as a way to help teachers analyze texts and select “just-right” books for small-group reading instruction and as a support for teachers to guide readers in choosing books. They never intended levels to be used by students. The levels on books are for teachers, not students.

“We do not recommend that students use the levels of a gradient to choose books for independent reading. The levels should be very unobtrusive (if not totally invisible) in your classroom. Students need to learn how to choose books based on their own assessment of readability, interesting topics or plots, favorite authors, and general appeal. You can teach students how to assess the appropriateness of texts they find interesting for their present reading levels.”

-Fountas and Pinnell, Teaching for Comprehending and Fluency, page 152.

I started thinking about teaching independence and how that connects to this quote. If our goal is to teach children to be independent, self-motivated, voracious readers – then aren’t we doing them a disservice by labeling books in our classroom with levels? This is going to encourage mindlessly choosing a book because “it’s a J” – not looking and thinking if it’s a good match. I think teachers have to teach children how to choose just-right books for themselves, not teach children to rely on a leveling system. I’m very concerned about the authenticity of teaching children to use the level of a book as a guiding factor. What happens when that child goes to the book fair, the public library, the bookstore or to a pile of books at a yard sale? Real readers in the real world don’t use a level to choose their books. If children have access to lots of books that are “just right” from guided reading and conferences – carefully selected by teachers for that student – and teachers are teaching kids what makes a “just right” book, then shouldn’t we be giving them the opportunity to practice this when choosing books from the classroom library, the public library, a bookstore or when out with their families? We want to create real world readers who can assess whether a book will be a good choice independently.

What happens when children are told their level? Often times that becomes the way a child defines himself as a reader – bragging “I’m a level M.” or, with head hung low, “I’m only a level E.” How do you define yourself as a reader? What would your answer be if someone asked you, “what kind of reader are you?” I would guess that no adult is going to identify herself as a level. I want my kids to say things like, “I’m a reader who loves Mo Willems, who likes to read books that are about real things and who can’t wait to see what new books arrived at the library.” Perhaps asking your students this question might give you some insight into what kind of readers they are becoming. Do we want kids who can identify what kind of reader they are or who can tell us what level they are?

Another thing that I’ve seen is a high level of competition and comparing in classrooms where children know their levels. Instead of clamoring to read the new Mo Willems book, or an enticing picture book displayed at the library, children quickly dismiss books if they are not on their level and start to look down on children who are at a lower level. At the other end, I’ve seen strong readers held back by their level – being made to stay at a level when they can really take on much more challenging and interesting texts because they’ve been identified at a level lower than where they are really reading. That level becomes part of the readers’ identity. Kids are ashamed to be reading at a level that is not associated with that grade level. The focus becomes all about a level instead of about reading, books, authors, genres, series books, or fabulous illustrations. When I sit down to confer with a child I never want the focus to be on what level we are aiming for. Do I have that in my head as a teacher? Of course. It’s a tool I use as a teacher. But I want children to be working on their reading and setting goals relating to thinking deeply about texts, authors, genres, a variety of topics, talking about reading with others, enjoying reading and creating a reading processing system that helps them in becoming fluent, flexible, strong readers. I don’t want their goal to be moving to the next level.

What happens when parents are told the level that their child is reading? Most parents have no idea what a “level J” book means. I’m concerned that this is making school reading and real world reading two different things. It’s creating a gap comparable to when we teach young children to use words like “schema” and “metacognition” – parents are mystified as to how reading instruction is happening. Parents may start to compare their child with others in the neighborhood, or try to push reading books at a much higher level than that child can handle at the moment. What if, instead of sharing a child’s reading level at conferences, teachers showed families examples of books where that child is reading now, and examples of benchmark texts for where we are heading? This helps families understand what their child is working on and helps them understand much more than a “level J” text.

So do my students know their reading level? No. These are a few reasons why. But are leveled books important? YES! Check back for Part II tomorrow when I will post on how I use leveled texts in my classroom as an important tool for teachers.

I would love any thoughts on this post. I realize this may leave some people uncomfortable or unsure or questioning our practice. But isn’t that what we want to do as educators? I invite you to ask yourself, your team and your school “how are we using leveled texts, and why?” As Lucy Calkins wrote in my The Art of Teaching Writing book many years ago, “be brave enough to outgrow your own best teaching”. Questioning and challenging how levels are being used, and what messages we are sending, might be an area where we need to be brave.

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On mentors

A mentor is defined as someone who guides another to greater success. I’m mentoring a new-to-kindergarten teacher this year, and it has caused me to reflect on who my mentors are. Of course, I could list so many of the authors of the books that line my walls – Nancie Atwell, Katie Wood Ray, Lucy Calkins, Donald Graves, Dick Allington, Ken and Yetta Goodman, Marie Clay, Debbie Miller, Steph Harvey and Anne Goudvis – just to name a few. We all have those mentors. The people we get excited to see in person at NCTE or IRA, the authors we wait in line for the chance to speak a word or two, the authors whose voices echo in our mind as we teach every day.

But as I reflected on this, I started thinking of the teachers I have taught with throughout the years. Teachers I have worked with who were in their first year or their twentieth have made an impact on my teaching to this day. I fear that we are entering an age of teaching where collaboration and sharing are discouraged. Stories of competition between teachers in the name of test scores frighten me. (for many reasons) Teaching can be a lonely profession. We can easily be isolated in our classrooms. Sharing and learning from our colleagues is so important and sometimes the littlest thing can stick with that teacher across the hall forever.

I want to thank a few of my teaching mentors I think about daily. You’ve given me ideas and inspiration that I carry into my classroom every day. I realize the danger of doing a post like this – I’m sure I will leave someone out. And really, everyone who I’ve had the privilege of teaching with has impacted me in some way. Thanks to Zoya Bankley Lucas, I still hand out “love notes” – tiny pieces of paper with fun messages – to my kids every day as we say good-bye for the day. Christy Thompson, Sam Straker, and Susan Cox are my inspirations for creating community in my classroom. They have taught me so much about honoring and respecting children and listening to them. I can hear their voices every day as I interact with my kindergarteners. Julie King taught me how important enthusiasm and patience are in a classroom. The joy she showed for her job and students, even in the face of challenges and frustration, is something I think of often when faced with difficulties. Pat Johnson’s voice comes to me often as I work with my young readers and writers. “What would Aunt Pat do?” is a thought I have at least once a day. Rosary Lalik and my cohort for the Literacy Studies master’s program at Virginia Tech truly transformed who I am as a teacher. Your voices blend into a symphony of support and encouragement to challenge me to think outside the status quo and always question and speak up for what is right for children. You help me be brave in my teaching. Melanie Rick taught me so much about arts integration. The lessons we planned and taught together help me every year as I integrate the arts into my teaching. Ann Mabry has helped me achieve balance in my life. I learned that I could be a good teacher and have a rich life outside of school through her. Kassia Omohundro Wedekind, Jessica Shumway, Debbie Gates and Michelle Gale, you have taught me to love teaching math. You come into my math workshop with me every day and help bring excitement, inquiry and fun to math. Shannon Christie, Lauren Price and Althea Greenstone make up my current kindergarten team. I learn from each of you and feel so grateful to be a part of a team who shares a common, child-centered philosophy and love for teaching kindergarten.

Thank you all.

Who are your teaching mentors? Who can you thank today for making you a better teacher?

Our Virginia Tech Literacy Studies cohort

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Be the Change – Reflections on #NCTE12

I just spent four days in Las Vegas at the NCTE annual conference engaging, learning and sharing with some of the most amazing educators on the planet. My head is spinning, my brain is full, and I cannot wait to get back in my classroom tomorrow. I have many thoughts to reflect on and share in upcoming blog posts, but for now, all I can think of is how lucky I am to be a teacher. The last four days reminded me of how much hope, possibility, passion and love there is in education. It is so easy to get bogged down in the day to day struggles, the isolation that can occur in our profession, the frustration from policies, standards, inequities, injustices and the overall feeling that teaching is being disrespected as a profession. But spending the last four days with thousands of educators who took time off school, flew across the country, many (if not most) on their own dime, prepared presentations to share the joyful work they are doing with students, and engaged in dialogue about making the world a better place through teaching, reminded me just how committed teachers are.

We can make a difference. And we are. Let’s keep the conversations that began at NCTE going, and let’s invite others in. Twitter is a fabulous place to see what was shared and discussed at NCTE (#NCTE12), and I’m sure there will be many, many blog posts, articles and even books that come out of the networking, conversations and pure possibility that occurred in Las Vegas. There are many teachers all over this country doing amazing work with children – engaging them in pursuing their passions, collaborating all over the globe, supporting them in making sense of struggle and injustices in our world while encouraging them to take action and teaching them that their words are power and that their voices matter.

It’s truly a great time to be a teacher. And as Mahatma Gandhi said, “be the change you wish to see in the world.”

What change will YOU be?

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We Teach Children

I just finished a week of preservice days – our children arrive on Tuesday. The week was a busy whirlwind of meetings, setting up the classroom, thinking through the first days and reconnecting with colleagues after summer vacation. As I left school on Friday I was reflecting on the week when I realized how inspired, energized and excited I am about the upcoming year. Our administration planned a wonderful week of meetings and activities that focused on creating community. We did not discuss test scores, school improvement plans or data. We spent time connecting with each other, exploring our strengths individually and as a team, and creating a shared vision for what the school year will bring and for the community we will all live in for at least 8 hours every day. There is plenty of time later to get into the scores, data and plans for the year – this week was all about creating that foundation that will allow us to work together as a team. It’s similar to that first week or so with our students. We have to spend time creating community, getting to know each other and making our classroom a safe space to learn. We need to go slow at first so that we can go faster later. I can’t express how much I appreciated my first week back being like that. And, yes, I do know how lucky I am. I wish everyone could experience a preservice week like that.

One of the things that I keep thinking about was something that was said during a math planning meeting. We have two new math specialists at our school so it was our first time meeting with them as a team. As we were discussing how we will go about planning instruction for our students, one of the math specialists said, “We teach children – not the standards, curriculum or tests. The children come first in our thinking and planning.” YES! This is so true. We DO teach children. We have to look at who they are as a learner, what they know, what they almost know, what they are struggling with and consider how they learn. Only after we have looked carefully at that can we consider the state standards, the textbook, the curriculum map or the information needed for the state tests. We have to put the children first.

So this year, when I am thinking, “what do I teach this week?” – my immediate answer will be “my children”. Only after I have thought about each of my learners will I look at the standards, curriculum, etc. and then decide the best way to make sure I am reaching the minds – and hearts – of the children entrusted to me every day.

Enjoy teaching children this year.

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