I came across this gif and I couldn't help but giggle. And now I have that song by Rick Ross in my head, only with the words "everyday I'm rustlin'", on repeat. This is the time of year when I find myself driving in my minivan, probably driving to drop off a kid or pick up a kid or grocery shop or rush somewhere, and suddenly I see that the leaves have changed. It's been happening all around me everyday and suddenly, I finally notice it and it makes me pause. It's such a beautiful, incredible thing that nature does every year. But everyday, during this time of year, especially in schools, we are hustlin'. We feel the pressure to get through our lessons, we move from one activity to the next, we meet to talk about kids and review assessment data. We start our day and before we know we are driving home, and then we do it all over again the next day. But do we stop to actually notice what is happening all around us? We might have spent several weeks trying to teach routines, like kids rotating through different stations during math time. Have you stopped to watch during math time? You may notice that all of sudden...they are doing it. Or maybe you were working on building up reading stamina, and now, all of sudden, kids are reading independently for longer periods of time. Like the leaves changing colors all around us, it's a beautiful, incredible thing that happens with our students during this time of year. But we as educators, we are hustlin'. We have this urge to put our heads down and do the work, move through the unit, teach the lessons, get through the daily schedule. And that's not a bad thing. That is us doing our jobs. But if there is all hustle and no pause, you miss a lot of amazingness. We certainly took time this weekend to pause and not just notice the colors of the leaves, but we also stopped to see that they were now all covering our yard and driveway! So of course my kids took some time to rake the leaves into giant piles and jump into them. Weekends are full of hustle too, but it's good to stop and just jump in a giant pile of leaves every once in a while. How will you pause and notice the beautiful, incredible changes happening in front of you in your classrooms this week? I purchased a few books at the book fair that I am excited to begin reading. The first is a graphic novel that is a memoir called They Called Us Enemy. This is about the George Takei's story of being a Japanese American sent to a "relocation center." I also got Alan Gratz's new book titled Two Degrees. He always does such a great job writing about important historical fiction; in this book he focuses on climate change. I spent some time this weekend rereading a great resource book that a good friend of mine wrote called Layers of Learning. This awesome book is full of read alouds and how you can use them to have caring conversations. Let me know if you want to borrow it!
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