We Are Words. Words We Are. Back To Graduate Course Work on Campus

Well, the "I hate Monday" mantra wasn't the case for me, because I actually wasn't in a hotel room or in a conference room or on an airplane. I simply worked from home, graded, organized, and planned for tonight's classes.

I'm doing something different this year, an innovation I love. I've invited members of Ubuntu Academy to co-teach my graduate courses by participating in classes, working as readers, and participating in bringing the theories we're reading to work.

Tonight, we are covering reading with 'word gaps' and 'quotes' as proposed by Beers and Probst, and working with argumentation through Gallagher, reading pace-work through McKenna and Robinson, and best practices suggested by Graham & Perin in back-to-back graduate courses for Developmental Reading in Secondary Schools and Teaching Writing, 3rd-12th grade.

Another innovation I'm growing fond of is using artwork to help tell the story of what it is I'm trying to accomplish and last night I collected many images from artists who create images simply by using words all over the blank canvas to form a portrait.

We are words. Words we are.

I'm still riding high from the NWP and NCTE experience, and I know I need to get our presentations into chapter and journal forms. That is on my mind, as is the need to work at the State level to promote the excellence of CWP-Fairfield. I wish I could pause time and hunker in a library for a semester to write up all we've collected over the years, but for now I must teach and I'm excited to do it. I believe it is a This Is Us night, too, but I haven't caught up on the other episodes.

I have a lot on my plate, and I will take one day at a time. I just wish there was more than 24 hours on the clock.