This is difficult. I now know what the kids must feel when they write and then anxiously await what the teacher has to say about it. I have no idea who, if anyone is reading these posts, but to even think that there is a possibility that someone is reading my words is daunting. Trying to come up with interesting topics is another story in itself. This is why I am going to take a page from twowritingteachers and institute Slice of Life Tuesdays. According to Wikipedia, the definition of a slice of life is:
a category for a story that portrays a "cut-out" sequence of events in a character's life. It may or may not contain any plot progress and little character development, and often has no exposition, conflict, or denouement, with an open ending. It usually tries to depict the every-day life of ordinary people, sometimes with fantasy or science fiction elements involved. The term slice of life is actually a dead metaphor: it often seems as if the author had taken a knife and "cut out" a slice of the lives of some characters, without concern for narrative form.
So here is my first "Slice of Life":
Sometimes things just fall into place in such a way that the universe seems to be sending you a message. I got the message today. Early in the day, I had an interesting conversation about JOY. It was an interesting conversation with an interesting person. We spoke about how we never really know how our kindness or outward expression of joy is going to affect the people we meet during the course of any day.
These thoughts lingered in my head as I went about my day, part of which was spent looking at some brand new books that were bought to teach comprehension strategies. I was drawn to a book called Ordinary Mary's Extraordinary Deed, by Emily Pearson. The book begins with Mary noticing some delicious looking blueberries on her way home from school. She picks them and leaves them anonymously on Mrs. Bishop's front step. Mrs. Bishop is so tickled that she makes muffins and gives them out to five people. Those muffins made each of those folks feel so happy that they did something extra nice for people in their lives-- mostly strangers. You are probably getting the picture -- each person "pays it forward" and does something special for five people. The COOLEST thing about this book is that at the end the math is shown-- it turns out that if this really happened, over 6 BILLION people would be affected. Chill bumps!
Pretty serendipitous that I should have that conversation and then pick up that particular book, huh? I love this book and I'm going to work on a lesson plan to go with it-- perfect for a project after CRCT. Perfect time to pay it foward!
Now it's your turn! If you have been apprehensive about posting something here, have a go at giving us a slice of your life! Don't leave me hanging out here all alone!
