Cardboard, Duct Tape, and Opportunities

My daughter Kate turns 10 tomorrow and for her birthday she would like an arcade theme. You see, my kids get to pick what they want to do on their day and choose how they want the dining room decorated. Then I do my best to make their vision a reality.

Kate is a maker. She can create anything out of nothing. Her current love is cardboard and duct tape. Her room is lined with games that she has made complete with a ticket dispenser and prize area. Games cost tokens that she will gladly give you as long as you spend time there.

Kate gets her creativity from me. And I get it from my father.  My father is a retired architect with a knack for drawing. I was an art major in college who loved all things color. I can always see the end product, and I know how to get to it. I didn't choose to be an art major because I thought I was going to be a great artist one day. I chose it because I liked art and frankly, I didn't think I was smart enough for any other field.

I didn't want to be an art teacher though. I wanted to be in the classroom teaching all subjects while incorporating art into my curriculum.

And I did.

For 21 years.

Some years I was able to include more art than others, but I still loved being in that type of classroom setting. The one where I was teaching students everything. I taught second grade for two years in Detroit. My first teaching home and one that helped mold the teacher I am today. I then moved onto  a small rural school in Leslie. I called White Pine  home for 13 years. White Pine gave me the flexibility to develop into the the teacher I knew I wanted to be. I cried when I left. After that, I spent six years as a fifth grade teacher in Bath at a school that would ultimately bring me full circle to the teacher I knew I was capable of being.

But things have changed since I started teaching 21 years ago and lately, I have been finding myself ready to go into the field of teaching I never imagined I would be.

This past May an opportunity presented itself to me. I spent a lot of time standing on the end of a diving board thinking. Wondering. Is this what I want to do? Is it the right time? What about my school? My team? The families that I have grown to love?

And after a while, I jumped.

This fall I will be creating my fourth home during my 22nd year of teaching. I will be teaching K-1 STEAM in Haslett, a job that I feel was made for me.

My mother would call this an opportunity. And she would be proud if she were here today. If anything, she taught me to never let opportunities pass you by. Opportunities, she would say, lead to growth. And growth allows you to be the person you were meant to be.

Kate's Birthday Arcade Game Creation

My Vision for Kate

Twenty Positives for Twenty Negatives

Today was a hard day.

It was a day that culminated 20 negatives.

Today was the 20th anniversary of my mother's death. A day I never thought would get here and one I never wanted to see.

Twenty years without my mother. Twenty years of questions only she could answer. But instead of dwelling on all the things I wish I could have had with her, I focused on 20 positives. Because that is what my mother would have wanted. That is how I was raised.

So in honor of my late mother, here are twenty positives that I found while reading my writing students' reflective letters of our year together.

1. "The entry I'm most proud of is the Best Part of Me because we got to talk about the best part of ourselves."
2. "I feel good when I write because it expresses me a lot. It calms me. I used to hate writing       because it was hard but now writing is easy and fun."
3. "I am really good at thinking of really random things to form a story."
4. "I have grown as a writer because I don't write in grocery list writing anymore."
5. "The biggest challenge for me as a writer is to not hurry stories. Instead I need to let the plot develop a bit first."
6. "I used to think writing was a side subject, but this year I have liked it more and now I think it is a true subject."
7. "I have grown so far as a writer this year by showing how I feel in my head, to putting it down on my paper."
8. "The piece of writing that I am most proud of are the reflections because I got to answer questions about my own writing."
9. "I love to write because you can express your feelings and it's really fun to just write about your everyday life. Like Slice of Life. You can just write about your day."
10. "My writing goal is to keep all my writing things that I've learned in my head. I will never, ever try to lose this information to improve as a writer in the future."
11. "I have grown as a writer sensationally." 
12. "I am most proud of my argumentative essay on chocolate milk. I like this the most because I did great on it and it was fun. What made my entry the best is the time I put into it."
13. "Throughout the year you have taught us that the sign of a good writer is that you make mistakes and put in effort." 
14. "I feel like this year in writing made me want to make books and I do like to entertain people, so I think that is what I want to do. Truly, I've grown to be a writer."
15. "I feel confident about writing and hope to continue in the future."
16. "I am most proud of my Alexander Hamilton obituary. I just feel like it has the most detail, and I definitely enjoyed writing it the most. Also, it was about Alexander Hamilton, of course I loved it."
17. "What I feel about writing is a good feeling because I think it will take me a long ways."
18. "At first I hated writing. It had so many rules and no fun to it but now I love it and I know there are ways to experiment, and I like it more because of you."
19. "I've grown as a writer because now I know how to argue better."
20. "The writing I am most proud of is when we did sacred writing and I wrote about being a goalie. I am most proud of this because you told me that it gave you goose bumps when you read it." 

Reflective Letters From Fifth Graders