Springs Brings Hope

Spring unveils itself as a season of hope. It reawakens earth, lifts spirits, and calls all beings back to nature. Spring is filled with hope evidenced by the blossoming of life. We cannot reach out and grasp hope but we can accept the spirit of possibility it offers in springtime. 

Hope is needed in this world of change and flux. Finding and spreading it is a call to action. 

Tonight, #G2Great offered an inspirational chat, Teaching Hope to the Next Generation. Since it was due time to check in with my one word, hope, I joined the chat to voice my thoughts with my colleagues. My friend, Dr. Mary Howard, opened the conversation with a confirming statement, "We need more HOPE in this world and that begins with our children who will lead the way. We have to make that a priority in our schools and classrooms." Agreeing with this statement, I added that building, cultivating, and sustaining cultures of trust and hope is essential. Classrooms must become havens of joyful learning and educators, as ambassadors of hope, need to bring the spirit of possibilities to all our students. In turn, they need to help students believe in their unique selves in order to find their greatness. 

The ending challenge of #G2Great asked us to state how we would become ambassadors of hope this week. What would we do to spread hope to our students or colleagues. Being a change agent is important to me so I said that I would take up the challenge by creating a digital inspiration to spur others to believe in possibilities. 

I created the above digital inspiration by appsmashing using PicMonkey and FotoJet.

#G2Great shared this beautiful digital titled,Teaching Hope to the Next Generation. The first stanza of Emily Dickinson's poem is here. You can read the rest of the poem at Poetry Foundation.

You may be interested in listening to these videos.

Today the Poetry Friday Roundup is hosted by the amazing Jama Rattigan. Please join me at Jama's Alphabet Soup that offers an eclectic feast of food, fiction, folderol and chewy culinary verse.

I am collecting offerings for my newest gallery, Spring-sational Spring, and hope that my Poetry Friday friends will grace the gallery with their inspirational digitals. I am adding the 2018 Progressive Poem with the names of the 30 contributors to the spring gallery.

Celebrate Sharper Points

This was a week of questioning, writing, and reflecting on finding my greatness after a rousing shot of inspiration at Monday night's #NYEDChat convo. My esteemed colleagues, Laura Robb, Dr. Mary Howard, and Evan Robb, guest moderated the Twitter chat while Dennis Schug and I manned the moderator desk. There was an amazing flow of spirited conversation throughout the convo and an immediate rush of excitement. Positivity was in the air. 

Yes, it was a night to remember. I was riding the high waves of life but sometimes, after a thrilling experience a flatness occurs. Exhaustion takes over and questions start popping up. "Where am I going? I must slow down. Remember that small moments matter." I spent the rest of the week subconsciously searching for the greatness of inner strength to flow like a fountain. Some of the days, the flow was scarcely enough and my writing got many false starts. Other days, thoughts were in the form of rewrites for the 6th Annual February Poem Project, the brainchild of Laura Shovan. 

Buncee Animated original is here.

I may have needed  a sharper point but I persevered and embraced hope.

It is time to Celebrate This Week with Ruth Ayres. Ruth has a wonderful story to share about her son moving onward with a resilient spirit.

Post Chat: Find Your Greatness

The countdown began early in the day. By midday, the momentum built up. Questions were loaded on TweetDeck and a fast flurry of pre-chat thoughts shared.  Our stellar team of educational friends, Laura Robb, Evan Robb, and Dr. Mary Howard, were ready to rock Twittersphere with burning questions and a topic for all, "Find Your Greatness". As the hour drew near, colleagues began sending tweets and tagging friends to join the convo. Then, the magic happened. I opened the doors to #NYEDChat and a tribe of tweeps, full of energy, gathered together in a virtual hall of conversation.  

For veteran tweeters and newbie chatters eager to grow as learners, nothing can match a virtual professional conversation for its depth, passion, collegial spirit, and instant shot of positivity. Let's take a look into the inner workings of an hour-long chat on Twitter. When visiting #NYEDChat be prepared for a fast-paced experience filled with greetings, quick responses, sidebar conversations, and beneficial, asynchronous professional development delivered to you in the warmth of your home. Topics are key and vary, professional learning a given, and growing a professional learning network a plus. Teamwork by a supportive and inviting group of connected colleagues who value and honor voice is evident. Everyone leaves the chat with a feeling of euphoria, a layer of new knowledge, new friends to chat with in the future, and an action step for the following week. 

Now let's dig deeper and see what transpired at last night's chat. Within five minutes of the opening remarks, Dennis Schug and I, along with our panel of all-stars, watched as comments, like fireworks split in the air causing a rush of excitement.  The news of #NYEDChat's trending on Twitter propelled a continuous flow of voices being raised across social media. Find Your Greatness tidbits of wisdom were shared along with one words to guide professional and personal journeys. The hashtag, #FindYourGreatness, was the spark for a stream of questions and amazing responses. It was heartwarming to see so many colleagues from different roles come together to exchange comments on the hows and whys of their journeys to find their greatness. 

For two hours after the airing of the convo, #NYEDChat was one of the top trending chats on Twitter. The conversation was filled with many memorable statements. Mary Howard was so excited by the awesomeness of the conversation that she storified the chat immediately. You can read that here. 

What a pleasure to spend an hour exploring GREATNESS

with it surrounding me at every turn."  - Mary Howard

Participate partners with NYEDChat and also created a transcript of the chat. You can access that here.

Wisdom Tidbits and Digital Inspirations from the #NYEDChat Community

Greatness -
a never-ending journey,

a pathway to betterment.

©CVarsalona, 2018

Greatness is something to strive for. 

The challenge to pursue greatness is so motivating.

©Brent Gilson, 2018

You can see Brent's Pe-Chat blog post here. 

The guest moderators and moderators were all excited that Brent had the enthusiasm to post before the chat. 

From Valerie Tilton

From Valinda Kimmel

From Stephanie Affinito

Evan Robb: 
Greatness evokes a desire to serve students, teachers and parents. 
"Not everybody can be famous but everybody can be great, because greatness is determined by service." 
-Martin Luther King Jr. 
Great to be here tonight. Lift others up and find the greatness that is in you and those you go through life with.

Dr. Mary Howard: 
Greatness means that we have left our thumbprint on those around us in some way that will live beyond ourselves and enrich the lives of others.
Question 2 reminds me that each of us are on our journey. I love and respect that our personal own journey can converge with the journey of others.
Greatness was never meant to be a lonely proposition. I love that we can do it in the company of others.

Laura Robb:
An honor to be here tonight with this dedicated and inspiring group of educators. Keep striving for greatness through your work and learning with others. Thanks to Dr. Mary Howard, Evan Robb, Carol Varsalona and Dennis Schug. Memorable chat!
Every time you reach out to another person, a student, and support them, treat them with kindness. You've taken a step toward greatness.

Thanks to the unwavering support and preparation of my all-star team of Laura Robb, Evan Robb, Dr. Mary Howard, and Dennis Schug, we planned, delivered, and lit up Twitter with powerful and inspirational statements from a "tribe of tweeps". Finding greatness is an ongoing pathway and what better way to walk the path than with like-minded professionals committed to impacting teaching, learning, and life. 

Request:
Since I could not capture all of the amazing quotes and digitals, please  leave your blog links, digitals, posters, and inspiration in the comment section for all to see how #NYEDChat's tribe of tweeps are finding their greatness.

In closing I leave you with a few digital inspirations to ponder.

©Brent Gilson, 2018

                      

©Carol Varsalona, 2018

Professional Wonder

As the school year nears closing, educators continue to find resources and avenues to explore their professional wonder. I am impressed by the hundreds of educators who aspire to seek knowledge and grow as learners each day on Twitter. Twitter chats provide excellent soil to plant seeds, share growth, and cultivate new gardens of thought. 

While not being able to join #G2Great on May 4th, I was fortunate to read the archived transcript and Dr. Mary Howard's Literacy Lenses post reviewing last week's educational chat with Cornelius Minor and Courtney Kinney.  You can access Mary's post here. I was intrigued by the way Mary synthesized the information from the #G2Great Twitter conversation, focusing on the theme of building a tapestry. She deftly wove her post together, providing the reader with a backward look on the chat and a forward plan to finish the year strong. 

For those who enjoy the journey of professional wondering like me, I hope you cultivate gardens of thought as you network and learn from other educators. By becoming a voice on Twitter, you can gather seeds of knowledge to support your journey and build your own Wonder Wall of quotes that extend your knowledge and assist you in helping your learners become unique voices in a diverse world of thought. 

From Mary's post and the thoughts garnered from Cornelius' and Courtney's nuggets of wisdom, I created a commitment statement that I will share with other educators as I continue to walk my journey as a wonderologist.

Educators: 
Stand on the precipice of change.
Hand in hand, lift thoughts while
cultivating gardens of unique blossoms,
places of wonder-filled opportunities
where individual seeds root and grow.

With passion, cultivate and care-tend

your garden, recording each growth. 

Step back in faith, vigilant harvesters. 
Watch the fruits of your patient labor:  
each blossom spreading and standing 
tall in harmony with many others. 

Reflect within your garden quadrants.
Find the inspiration to start afresh
With yet another garden bearing blossoms.
You are the tillers of the soil of knowledge.
You are the cultivators of immense learning.
You are educators who finish the year strong!
©CV, 2017

I offer this to post to #DigiLitSunday where the topic is professional wonder. This topic stems from last week's #WonderChat where Dr. Mary Howard was the guest host discussing Instilling a Sense of Professional Wonder.