Celebration: Still Smiling

Posted on June 7, 2014 by carriegelson

Thank you to Ruth Ayres, for the inspiration and the Celebration Link up that she hosts each week. I have realized that this celebration is an important way I find balance and calm. I treasure this #celebratelu community.

So . . . I have mentioned it a few times on this blog in the last few weeks but contract negotiations between the British Columbia Teacher’s Federation (our teacher’s union) and B.C. Public School Employer’s Association (bargaining on behalf to the government) continue to escalate in numerous terrible ways. I wake up in the morning and think, “Is this just a really bad dream?” But no, it isn’t. My job, that I love, has all kinds of outside things attached to it that are awful. Like an impending full scale strike, weekly rotating strikes across the province, being locked out for recess/lunch and needing to be off school property by 3:45 p.m (and not arriving before 8:15 a.m.) and the very delightful, 10% deduction from our daily rate of pay that was deemed legal by the Labour Relations Board this week. Much media is quite biased but this piece gives details of the history of bargaining between the Liberal government and teachers.

This letter from a parent is pretty powerful: Beware the power of Mama Bears Oh the power of parent voice!

Last week, I was not coping well with all of this. This week, somehow, I am still smiling. And this is what I celebrate. All of the little moments that I hang on to that allow me to keep smiling. All of the moments that honour the classroom community that we have created over the year. I may only be paid 90% of my salary each day, our three weeks left of school might suddenly only become one, financially I may not know how we are going to manage (my husband is a teacher too) but all of these little moments are mine. And I hold on tight to them.

Sharing a few here . . .

Thanks to the wonderful Miriam who works with me, we get to participate in outside yoga as part of our Physical Education program each week!

We have a room full of readers. Passionate, skilled readers who love nothing better than time to read!

There is much math joy!

Happiness over a shared experience like a soccer clinic hosted by high school students can be seen on these exhausted, proud faces on the bus ride home.

We are a class that helps each other. No asking often. Just stepping up. With smiles.

These are my moments. I celebrate how much I love being a teacher.

Celebration: Let there be music

Posted on May 31, 2014 by carriegelson

I am digging deep this week. Usually writing this post is a source of joy. Today, after a very long week, I mostly want to crawl into my bed and hide under the pillows. But, I am pretty certain, that this is all the more reason to find things to celebrate. I thank Ruth Ayres, for the inspiration and her Celebration Link up that she hosts each week.

This week there is huge escalation between the British Columbia Teacher’s Federation (our teacher’s union) and B.C. Public School Employer’s Association (bargaining on behalf to the government). There are rotating strikes – so we were out of the classroom on Monday and now the government has locked us out for part of every day and is deducting 10% of our daily salary each day. We can not arrive at school before 8:15 a.m. and must leave by 3:45 p.m. We are not permitted to work with students over recess or lunch. It is ugly and stressful. I am exhausted and feeling disorganized and completely out of sorts. I love my job but I have lots of needs in my room. The teaching and learning work when I am energetic and “on my game.” This week, with everything going on, it was hard to be in that place. A challenging week to feel inspired and passionate about a job that I love. Which just felt all kinds of wrong.

But at the end of the week, I do have gratitude. When I look back over the week, there were many happy moments with the children. And there was one half hour block that was my “guaranteed happy” – our music class on Thursday afternoon with Jill Samycia Recently I wrote a letter in support of what this outreach program means to me. I am sharing it here:

Every week, there is almost a guarantee that I will be moved to tears with my students. Not out of sadness. Or anger. Or frustration. But out of pure joy.

This moment happens Thursday afternoons when my children (an energetic Grade 2/3/4 class) come upstairs to sing with Jill Samycia from St. James Music Academy. On the way up there is noise – singing, humming, chatter. On the way down it is louder, inspired by thirty minutes of time with Jill. While we are there, there is rarely a silent moment. A second here or there when we breathe between lyrics and the piano momentarily stops. Between songs, the children are buzzing. They make requests. They keep singing a favourite part. They are negotiating who will sing with who if there are “solos” Natter, natter, natter. And then Jill begins to play and whoa . . . Whoa.

My chatty, energized, silly class rises up and sings. It is precious and magical and shockingly amazing. These children belt out lyrics. Elements of soul, passion and emotion reveal themselves. They smile. They sway. Some get up and dance. We all get lost in the song. I often kind of cry. Because Jill finds the place inside of these children that is talent and music and confidence and risk taking all rolled into one.

She brings it out and it shines bigger each week. It strengthens who we are as a community. It strengthens the spirit of each child. I catch smiles of happy and proud and calm. Children sing solos that are barely audible at first. Others knock us over with throaty style that seems to channel from some older, wiser soul. Some of these kids are kids who barely say boo in class. Others are kids who never stop talking. But when we sing, we all have voice. When we sing together . . .

So Thursday afternoon is a beautiful, inspired time with my students and with Jill. Guaranteed wonderful. Guaranteed magic. A piano. A room full of kids. A talented teacher who has ways . . . Let there be music.

Thank you St. James Music Academy and the amazing outreach program. Thank you Jill Samycia.

With gratitude and Thursday tears,

Carrie Gelson

Grade 2/3/4 Teacher

Seymour Elementary

This I celebrate! Thank you to Jill and the sounds of singing that gave me my “guaranteed happy” in a challenging week. It always means a lot. This week, it was especially wonderful. And oh so needed 🙂

Wishing everyone a wonderful week!

Celebration: Ivan: One, Only, Ours

Posted on May 23, 2014 by carriegelson

I love ending each week thinking about all that I have to celebrate. Join Ruth Ayres who shares a Celebration Link up on her blog each week. Thank you to Ruth for the inspiration.

I celebrate Ivan, Mighty Silverback and his story, shared.

This week, we finished the brilliant, beautiful and special story The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate. This is the third time I have read this book but the first time I have read it aloud. As a read aloud, it is pure magic.

My students have already shared their brilliant thinking on our classroom blog. This celebration post highlights our closure with the book. Finishing a novel this profound needs some time. We finished the story Thursday morning. When I read the last few words, there was a brief silence. The power a read aloud has to create community was felt in the room. Some kids crawled into my lap, some asked to hold the book (I noticed that they hugged it before passing it on), many just sat and let the story wash over them. Big smiles. Big feelings.

On Friday, we read the author’s note in the back and checked out three websites/videos. We . . .

looked at Katherine Applegate’s information about the real Ivan on her website.
watched the video I found on Mr. Shu‘s blog Watch. Connect. Read. about the upcoming picture book about Ivan!

looked at the information and video from the Zoo Atlanta site about Ivan. The children found it incredible to watch the real Ivan move about. We had to watch the video two times in a row!

Here we are watching Katherine Applegate talk about her picture book Ivan: The Remarkable True Story of the Shopping Mall Gorilla to be released in October 2014 (illustrated by one of our favourites: G. Brian Karas).

Watching the real Ivan in the Zoo Atlanta video. Absolute joy and fascination on their faces!

We ended the day with Ivan themed yoga! Thank you to the brilliant Miriam who led us through tree poses in the jungle, Ivan knuckle walking, downward dog poses to greet Bob and entwining elephant trunks in honour of Stella and Ruby.

Before our yoga session, the children did a quick final response. Some excerpts here:

“The novel was amazing because the writing was just right. Ivan didn’t break his promise.”

“Ivan is one of my favourite novels because Ivan saved Ruby.”

“I wish we could go to the zoo to meet Ivan. Did he hang out with his friends?”

“I don’t like the way he was being treated. This was my favourite novel because it was emotional and it was read very slowly. I didn’t have to say ‘Can you say that again a lot of times.’ I feel happy he was in a zoo at the end and it made me happy. It made me even more happy to see the video.”

“So Ivan is a gorilla and he died. I am going to save him. I will dig a hole and I will find Ivan. I will use a defibrillator to make Ivan come back alive. And I will take him home to Africa.”

This little writer was particularly inspired and touched by Ivan and his real and fictional story.

“I’m excited for the picture book because all the kids or anyone should know the story. The picture book will be amazing because the illustrator is one of my favourites. I feel so awesome that people saved an animal that had a cruel life. And after they saved him, he had a wonderful life. I want to see Ivan’s artwork. I heard he’s a very talented artist.”

Isn’t it funny that this story of Ivan, a gorilla, teaches us so much about what it is to be human? Oh, how we celebrate this book!

Celebration: A turn around day

Posted on May 17, 2014 by carriegelson

I love ending each week thinking about all that I have to celebrate. Join Ruth Ayres who shares a Celebration Link up on her blog each week. Thank you to Ruth for the inspiration.

This week I am celebrating a day that turned out brighter and better than I could possibly have imagined.

My Thursday this week started off with that dreaded middle of the night yell, “Momma!” My son sometimes eats something that doesn’t agree with him and he wakes up in the early morning hours and begins to vomit. Poor little guy will throw up every 10 to 20 minutes for hours. Now that he is older, this happens much less frequently but it always knocks him out for a full day while his system recovers.

So Thursday in the wee hours of the morning I was booking a substitute, writing out plans to send to the secretary and rushing in to my son every 10 minutes or so. By 8:30 a.m., my husband was at work, my daughter was off to school, my son was finally sleeping and I was exhausted. A day doomed from the start it seemed.

I tiptoed around the house cleaning up breakfast dishes, starting laundry and finally sitting down to rest myself with a book. An hour or so later my day began to turn around.

I celebrate . . . .

Elisabeth Ellington giving me this very special and unexpected gift:

Today on my blog I celebrate @carriegelson and all the ways I learn from her: http://t.co/osZeOuPh0W

— Elisabeth Ellington (@elisabethelling) May 15, 2014

What an honour to be the first blog shared on a new feature on Elisabeth’s blog: Blogs I can’t do Without:There’s a Book for That Not surprising of course, is that Elisabeth’s blog: The Dirigible Plum is one of my very favourites. Thank you Elisabeth! This meant more to me than you know.

Quiet time with my recovering son. It is so terrible when they are ill but I loved the time with my son as he began to feel better. We made jello. We snuggled and read books. Precious time.

Picking my daughter up from school. This year is the first time I have worked full time since my children were born. I no longer get to pick them up at least one day a week from school. It was so lovely to go and get my daughter and walk home with her. She was full of happy energy telling me about her day. And of course, first thing, asked of her brother and expressed her sadness that he had missed a soccer event at school that he had been looking forward to.

My celebration now runs into Friday –

My morning started being greeted with this message on the board:

Friday was Sports Day at school and some children had left a message on the board Thursday p.m. to greet everyone on Friday. Pretty special to begin the day with a big laugh! I celebrate Happy Spots Day!

I then got to read my note from the substitute teacher who was in my room on Thursday. It was a fantastic note all around and reminded me that the world does not fall apart when we need to be away suddenly and unexpectedly – there are wonderful teachers to step in and enjoy the children and amazing people as part of my team to hold it together. I celebrate this reminder and the incredible staff I work with. Some pieces of her note:

“What a wonderful surprise for me this morning to get the call to come into your class. I follow you on twitter and last year during my B Ed. at UBC, I wrote an entire term paper on poverty and cited you and Janet Steffenhagen’s articles from the newspaper throughout. Your advocacy for your students is incredible and really inspires me. I also love your book recommendations :-)”

“I had the most lovely day in your class. Miriam was amazing and led many of the routines, mindfulness and gratitude circle. It was great to watch her and learn from her.”

Students and staff raved about the wonderful energy of this guest teacher and her note meant so much to me.

And finally, I celebrate the joy of a happy Sports Day (no spots at all!) full of fun and families and lots of smiles. I will let these few photos tell the story.

Being away for a day made being back with these little people all the more special! Lucky me.

Wishing everyone a wonderful week.

Celebration: Following the questions

Posted on May 10, 2014 by carriegelson

I love ending each week thinking about all that I have to celebrate. Join Ruth Ayres who shares a Celebration Link up on her blog each week. Thank you to Ruth for the inspiration.

This week I am celebrating the power of books to cause a stir. To inspire questions. To promote thinking and lots of discussion.

Last weekend I read a title that I just knew I had to share with my class: Ruby’s Wish written by Shirin Yim Bridges and illustrated by Sophie Blackall.

I brought it in early in the week to read aloud. Students were surprised by so much in this book about a little girl in a prosperous Chinese family wants an education like her brothers and male cousins. She doesn’t want to settle with only marriage and motherhood. This story was especially powerful because it is based on the life of the author’s grandmother. A beautiful example of a little girl who speaks up and the grandfather who hears her. The children were shocked that at one time in China’s history, a man could have multiple wives. They were most surprised that boys could go to University when girls could not. When Ruby received an admission letter for University from her Grandfather, there was lots of nodding. And then the questions. The biggest one: “But why could the boys go to school and the girls couldn’t?” I asked the children if they would like to read more books that explored this question. The room erupted, “YES!”

And so, the next day I brought in Every Day is Malala Day by Rose McCarney with Plan International and read it to the students. This book is a photographic thank you letter to Malala Yousafzai for her courage and her determination to speak up for the rights of girls to have an education. Both text and photos (of girls all over the world) are powerful.

“People everywhere wondered why it was so hard for girls to have an education. But you and I know the answer. In many countries bullets are not the only way to silence girls.”

This book inspired outrage. Confusion. Upset and indignation. And rich, important discussion. I overheard two little girls talking about this book as they looked at it again together.

“It’s the ladies who should be having the most education because they are mostly watching the kids and kids have lots of questions. The Moms need to know stuff.”

On Friday Morning, with the intention of sharing Who Says Women Can’t Be Doctors?: The Story of Elizabeth Blackwell written by Tanya Lee Stone and illustrated by Marjorie Priceman, I put this statement on the board in the morning:

As students noticed it, it became very interesting in the room. There was whispering. Some children raced over to me immediately.

“Ms. Gelson, why did you write that on the board? Womens can be whatever they want!”

More children started to express their upset and confusion.

“I can be a Doctor. I’m a girl. I can be.”

“Really, I can’t be a Doctor?”

“Oh no. The girls are going to be mad about this. I don’t think it’s true.”

“No. It is true. My Mom was told she couldn’t be a Doctor in her country.”

“Are the girls only allowed to be nurses? That’s stupid.”

I had to reassure everyone that I didn’t believe this statement but had put it up as a writing prompt. I asked them to go write for 10 minutes about their thinking. Many leaped up to share their thoughts with each other as they wrote.

Excerpts from some student writing are shared below. Note that I am sharing the writing from both boys and girls here:

“Why can’t women be doctors? It is silly. It can be possible for women to be doctors. Women can be whatever they want.”

“Silly! Sad! Because the girls don’t get to be doctors and the boys do. The girls just have to be the stinky old nurses. Why can’t the boys be the nurses and the girls be the doctors?”

“Women can be whatever they want if they put their heart to it! That makes me mad. That’s so silly. That’s not fair. Why would they think that? Wwwwwwhy!!!??”

“Some womens can be doctors if they’re more smarter than the boys. All that matters is about knowledge. It doesn’t matter if you are female or male.”

“Why? It makes me mad because they can. Girls are smart. They should have an education.”

“It seems really unfair if this is true. Because if boys are doctors, girls can be doctors too.”

This little thinker worked out her questions and thinking as she went.

“Why only boys can be doctors, not girls? Can girls and boys be doctors? Can it be girls too? Girls can be doctors too”

This girl who wants to be a doctor, wrote this very powerful statement”

“That is silly. I am a doctor. Why can boys be everything? I am happy because I live in Vancouver. And in Vancouver, I can be everything! And in Vancouver in 2014, I can do everything!”

We came back to the carpet and I pulled out the book to read. But one little girl insisted she had to ask something before we started:

“What is it with all of these books talking about girls who can’t do things and can’t have education and stuff? Girls here can go to school just like boys.”

Then the beauty of classroom conversation took over. I sat back. Some children shared about their mothers in other countries not having the same possibilities. Some children reminded everyone that it is different in history and different in other countries. There was lots of talk and lots of buzz and finally we were able to begin this book.

Who Says Women Can’t Be Doctors?: The Story of Elizabeth Blackwell written by Tanya Lee Stone and illustrated by Marjorie Priceman

We only read the first five or six pages and I had to promise that we will finish it next week. The best request?

“Can we talk more like this next week too?

Celebration: All things literacy

Posted on May 3, 2014 by carriegelson

I love ending each week thinking about all that I have to celebrate. Join Ruth Ayres who shares a Celebration Link up on her blog each week. Thank you to Ruth for the inspiration.

What am I celebrating this week? All things literacy. Some conversations. Some great books. Celebrations of writing. Thinking. Sharing. Listening. Creating.

Celebrating . . .

1. A Skype visit with Liesl Shurtliff – author of Rump: The True Story of Rumpelstiltskin (one of the best read alouds out there!)

This was an absolute highlight of our week! I shared our experience on our classroom blog here (including how we prepared). This was our first author Skype so it was especially exciting! Liesl was so charming and the kids cannot stop talking about the day!

Students shared with Liesl that they had just had a book of stories published as well and that we had even had a publishing party. (Thanks Writer’s Exchange!) Such fun to find out that Liesl had brownies at her publishing party too! All about the treats!

Here is one of the many pixies that we shared with Liesl during our Skype. All of them can be seen at the link I shared above.

2. Friday afternoon in my class was hot. The air circulation is terrible. And yet, my classroom looked like this:

Recipe for such engagement? I asked the students to think about what their dream house would look like if they could design it, have it built (or build it themselves) and then live in it? We split into two groups and spent 15 minutes sharing our ideas. Ms. Wilks, our Project Teacher and I recorded all that was said on chart paper. Kids got totally excited just listening to what other people suggested. A few examples:

Gummy worm walls that grow new candy when you pull it off
Trampoline floors
An aquarium full of dolphins to swim with
Water slides leading to an outdoor pool
Chalkboard walls to draw on

I quickly showed them the end pages in Chris Van Dusen‘s If I Built a House as some added inspiration. (Next week we will do a related project in Art) We then passed out writing books and told everyone to go draw, sketch, label and write. Some kids were so into it, they continued working through their Choices time.

In the middle of the brainstorming, one student who had been listening from his desk sailed a paper airplane over to us. Written on the back? Be Smart! He thought we were being absolutely ridiculous in our dreaming, “No house could have all of that!” I loved his message system! Not every activity is going to speak to everyone!

It was so interesting to examine all of the different ideas and how they were represented.

This little house designer showed me that she would have a book gnome (bottom right corner) that would get you any book you wanted for your book shelf. 🙂 A little reader with big book dreams like mine!

3. Last week we celebrated publishing a class book of stories.

To thank the amazing Writers’ Exchange for working with my class, I have been working on a blog post with the children’s words and photographs. We wanted it to be a sent along to surprise all of the staff and mentors who worked with us. It’s supposed to be a surprise but these photos are just too cute. So I’ve had to share one . . . or two . . . or . . . four. . . via twitter. It has been joyous both taking and sharing these photos (text comes from individual writing from each child). I’m hoping to have the post finished in the next few days.

Okay, sneak peek at our thank you: How we love the @writers_ex #vsblearns pic.twitter.com/aWj0lbEgq6

— Carrie Gelson (@CarrieGelson) May 1, 2014

We’re serious! We love the @writers_ex and we really mean it! pic.twitter.com/qV7BGn8VP3 — Carrie Gelson (@CarrieGelson) May 2, 2014

We are overflowing with creative energy! Thanks @writers_ex! For everything! pic.twitter.com/aod0irIkvm

— Carrie Gelson (@CarrieGelson) May 2, 2014

Whoa. It’s exhausting being published authors. Thanks @writers_ex! pic.twitter.com/IfrBz3AnNO — Carrie Gelson (@CarrieGelson) May 3, 2014

Wishing everyone a wonderful week!

Celebration: April is a beautiful month to . . .

Posted on April 25, 2014 by carriegelson

I love ending each week thinking about all that I have to celebrate. Join Ruth Ayres who shares a Celebration Link up on her blog each week. As always, thank you to Ruth for the inspiration.

This week, I am celebrating for two weeks as I was away with my family last weekend. Springtime in Vancouver is magical. And April is a beautiful month to . . .

#1 Take an Easter trip with my family

Over Easter, we spent four nights away at our favourite beach house to rent in the San Juan Islands. I treasured this time away with my family – to read, to play games, to talk over long breakfasts. And to walk on the beach and explore.

I did many walks with my son in the first few days when my daughter and husband were ill.

And then my daughter recovered and the three of us had wandering beach adventures.

I celebrate our conversations and time shared.

#2 Have a birthday

While we were away it was my birthday but I began celebrating the day before when I received this beautiful book from my class.

Thank you to Miriam who works with me for putting this together (she covered an old Dick and Jane reader to make the book). I had tears opening it up with the children and read it many times over the weekend. It is something I truly treasure. Each page is covered in little notes, pictures and words from the children. The messages are full of love and the little touches from Miriam are so thoughtful. Notice the title which is a take on the name of this blog and the author (The Curiosity Racers) is the name of our class blog (representing the children in our class).

#3 Launch a class book of stories

Thanks to the Writer’s Exchange (amazing, amazing, amazing), my students got to work with volunteer mentors over a 4 week period to write a creative story. In our stories, our characters transformed into a different version of ourselves and had a bit of an adventure. During Spring Break, the stories were published into a class book titled The Other Side of Me. Each child received a book to take home and we had a book launch party on Wednesday morning.

Some children were brave enough to read their story aloud to their peers while everyone followed along.

These sisters were very excited that Mom came along to celebrate!

I am thrilled to celebrate the pride my students feel being published authors!

#4 End Friday afternoon with outside yoga

We are so fortunate in our classroom that Miriam teaches us yoga. On this beautiful Friday, we headed out and did yoga in the sun with cherry blossoms all around.

Stretch

Balance

Reach

Breathe

Wishing everyone a wonderful week with much to celebrate!

Celebration: All is better with a little gold dust

Posted on April 4, 2014 by carriegelson

Celebration honoured. This is the loveliest of reasons to share. Join Ruth Ayres who shares a Celebration Link up on her blog each week.

I had a fantastic week back with my students. I think all of us were thrilled to be together again after a two week break, learning and sharing. I have many things to celebrate this week!

1. I loved all of the #MustReadin2014 spring updates shared by a wonderfully keen reading community. The Must Read phenomenon was born out of an attempt to gain some control over unruly TBR lists that grow and grow! Check out my update and links to update posts here. Flora and Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures by Kate DiCamillo is one of my favourite books read so far from this list. Maybe even more special because I read it aloud to my children and we all loved it.

2. I was thrilled to have a Nerdy Book Club post published this week. I saw a request from Colby Sharp for some retro review posts to be shared on twitter a few weeks ago. I have written some other Nerdy posts but never one in this category. I asked Colby if I could share something a little different instead of a review of one specific title. I wanted to go “retro” and look back at titles treasured with my children (now 11!) when they were preschool age. It was a nostalgic look back at books we adored. Read the post here.

3. I read the powerful picture book Each Kindness by Jacqueline Woodson illustrated by E.B.Lewis to my class this week.The reactions and comments were quite incredible. I think I might share some of their thinking and writing on our classroom blog. But the most interesting moment came with the ending. If you have read this book, you know that it ends with Chloe standing at the shore of the pond feeling a mix of regret, sadness and guilt. Her opportunity to offer kindness to Maya is gone. The story ends with these words:

“I watched the water ripple as the sun set through the maples and the chance of a kindness with Maya was becoming more and more forever gone.”

At first there was silence in the room and then one girl erupted, “What?! That’s terrible! It’s a terrible ending!” “It’s not terrible. It’s just not happy so it’s confusing a bit,” someone else added. Another child piped up,”It makes you think about drama and saying sorry. It makes us think. It’s good.” As we were getting ready to move on to Reading Workshop, another child said, “I liked it. I have been waiting for a bad ending in a book. Not bad like not good but every ending shouldn’t be happy – that’s not how life is.” This little girl asked me to help her find a new novel and we kept talking about the story. I asked her if she wanted to put her thoughts into a reader’s statement (we have a huge wall of these posted on a bulletin board). She came up with something that I think is quite brilliant:

Readers can’t always expect a happy ending.

That books inspire discussions and thinking like this – this, I celebrate!

4. Ah . . . book love! My students were happy to be back to our classroom full of books. I sensed it on Monday morning when an instant hush fell upon the room when we started Reader’s Workshop. I did “book commercials” for new books all week and this generated lots of excitement.

I felt the book love when I saw “who reads it next” lists being created and stuck to new books.

I felt it as I observed the wonderful engagement of one to one time with various adults who listen to children read and talk about stories and thinking with the students.

I sensed it when listening to the the buzz around the book bins during buddy reading time with the K/1 class.

Ah . . . book love!

5. If you have hung in reading this very long Celebration post (it was a wonderful week!), here is the pot of gold 🙂 One of our students makes a lot of paper objects and sculptures all throughout the day. It helps him to focus and listen. We started thinking . . . Wouldn’t it be great to showcase some of his work? Wouldn’t it be better if it was spray painted gold? Absolutely! Here is the young artist at work, gold paint in action!

And here is the installation. Thank you to the amazing Miriam (the Support Worker who I get to work with every day!) for her huge role in displaying and advertising the “piece.” There are flyers pasted up all over the school! When this boy’s Mom came in to see this art and got hugely proud and teary, we all got teary. It was a moment.

I celebrate all the many ways this is golden . . .

What are you celebrating this week?

Celebration: Time to . . .

Posted on March 28, 2014 by carriegelson

Celebration honoured. This is the loveliest of reasons to share. Join Ruth Ayres who shares a Celebration Link up on her blog each week.

I am now at the end of a two week Spring Break holiday and I am happy to celebrate time to . . .

Do the things I don’t always have time to do! Like:

Reclaim my garden from winter’s coverings and a few years of post-reno neglect. I know that the gardening bug has bit me again full force because my head is full of thoughts like this:

“If I make a big fruit salad, I will have more peels to put into the compost . . . “
“This rain is so good for the plants I just divided and transplanted.”
“How should I mark where I want to put bulbs in this fall?”

Tackle the to do list This week I cleaned my closet, organized kitchen drawers, compiled receipts and sorted clothes my children have outgrown.

Visit the bookstore! I love nothing more than hours at the bookstore (Kidsbooks here in Vancouver is one of my very favourite places) to explore. I inevitably lose my children numerous times. My daughter is pretty easy to find. She is usually nestled into a corner reading – lost only in a book that has captured her.

Read a novel with my children and keep reading when they beg for one more chapter 🙂

We are now just chapters away from finishing the highly engaging final book in the Ascendance Trilogy by Jennifer A. Nielsen – The Shadow Throne.

Write posts that have been swirling about in my head. This week I wrote a post called What also happens here? This post addresses what we don’t often write about as teachers – the upset in the room.

What have you celebrated this week?

Celebration: Stories, Special Days and Spring cleaning (no, not windows)

Posted on March 22, 2014 by carriegelson

Celebration honoured. This is the loveliest of reasons to share. Join Ruth Ayres who shares a Celebration Link up on her blog each week.

Stories

I can’t think of a week where I don’t celebrate the power of stories and connections through stories.

This week I celebrate sharing my student’s comments and responses to Soccer Star written by Mina Javaherbin and illustrated by Renato Alarcão (to be released in April of 2014). Such a special title – my students’ reactions reveal how wonderful this title is to share in the classroom. Thank you to Mina for making sure I got a copy of this book to have in my classroom. It is already treasured.

I also celebrate being mentioned here with such a lovely compliment by one of my favourite authors Deborah Heiligman on the INK blog this week. Thank you to Deborah for honouring my love of nonfiction and my love of my students. I especially love connecting the two! This post reveals exactly how magical Deborah’s book The Boy who Loved Math was in my classroom.

Special Days

Don’t ask my husband because he will not be able to tell you but . . . it was in fact 17 years ago today that I walked down the aisle in a green dress carrying a bouquet of white tulips to the song The Girl from Ipanema and married this man I share my life with. Two beautiful children, lots of strong cups of morning coffee and many memories later, I am happy to celebrate this day! Here he is below (casting for hours) when we celebrated our anniversary last year at our favourite place to rent in the San Juan Islands.

Spring Cleaning (not windows and baseboards but gardens and blogs)

In the garden . . . A few years ago we renovated our house and my lovely garden survived but just barely. Life has been busy (working full time doesn’t lend itself to morning coffee and gardening mid week!) and it is only now that I am truly trying to revive the spaces I love so much. This transformation has no budget so it is basically going like this: Has it survived? Split it, move it, celebrate it. Right now, this involves a lot of cutting back, weeding and contemplating.

On the blog . . .

I have finally had time to deal with all of my little notes to myself to add to certain lists, update posts, etc. on this blog.

In the last few days, I updated these lists with new titles.

Big issue Titles

The appeal of a series: Hook some young readers!

Death & Bereavement

I also had a chance to post this post: Make the Time: 15 things that matter It was something that has been rolling around in my head for a while and with all of the gardening, it came together. I would love if anyone in the Celebration community would like to add a comment on the post. I have the feeling many of you would have much to share. Many thanks!