Celebrating This Week's Bests

I Am Celebrating:

Something I Accomplished: This week started off with the theme transitions posted by Margaret Simon for DigitLit Sunday. I was delighted to reflect upon that word and how it would affect my week both professionally (transitions are the dabs of glue needed to make the vision connect with the content) and personally (decluttering led to the creation of a sanctuary of tranquility).

Something I Did For Fun: I decided that this blog needed a pick-me-up in keeping with my thoughts on the power of voice and digital change. I transformed my blog site to make it more visually appealing. You can let me know what you think of the the new design.

Almost Wonderful Mini-Trip: We thought that the cherry blossoms were going to pop this weekend so we planned a short trip to Washington, D.C. to see my daughter and son-in-law. Unfortunately, the weather changed and the blossoms will peak next week when my daughter is out of town for a business trip. The photo below from National Cherry Blossom Festival will be the only sighting I will have of the cherry blossoms this year.

Favorite Quote of the Week:
Have words wash over your brain! ~Douglas Fisher

Most Relaxing Activity:

My Gentle Yoga session this week provided the opportunity to stretch, increase my balance, and sink into quiet time.

Wonderful Conference I Attended:

Ann Weiss of McGraw-Hill Education brought Douglas Fisher to Long Island for a morning workshop. I am a huge fan and was delighted to hear Doug speak about purpose-driven learning. Take-Aways from the presentation: 

• Teach why and what we are learning.
• Teaching isolated strategies does not raise comprehension levels. 
• Teacher modeling should be punctuated with student talk.

Best Gift:

A copy of Nancy Frey and Douglas Fisher's book, Rigorous Reading: 5 Access Points for Comprehending Complex Text.

Wonderful Chat of the Week: 

This week I co-moderated #NYEDChat with Dan McCabe and guest moderator, Connie Hamilton of #TMchat. The topic was instructional leadership. The conversation was engaging and lively. Connie provided many thinking maps on the topic. One of her quotes that resonated with me is: "Vertical alignment and coherence are KEY!"

What I Look Forward To: 

• Palm Sunday Mass when are Cathedral will reopen. 
• The launch of Wonderopolis' Wonder Ground on March 21st. I have been uploading material to my Wonder Lead Ambassador blog site but hit a snag tonight when my password did not work. 
• Reading the posts from Ruth Ayres' Celebrate This Week bloggers and those from Two Writing Teachers' March SOLSC. (Please visit those sites to enjoy the celebrations and slices of life.)

Transitions have been a major part of my week and these have helped me clear a path to simplifying my life as I wrote in my Spiritual Journey Thursday blog. This post today marks the nineteenth one of my series, Clearing a Path.