Dublin Literacy Conference

On Saturday I got to attend the Dublin Literacy Conference in Columbus.  It was amazing.  I love the chance to listen to other teachers and experts in our field share their ideas.  I went to Dublin thinking that the highlight of the day was going to be Penny Kittle (who was amazing), but the real highlight was the turnout by Lebanon teachers.

Teachers and principals from Donovan, Bowman, and Berry seemed to be everywhere.  I even went to a session where the spectacular Megan Ginther (fifth grade teacher at Berry) presented her ideas on literacy contracts.  I was amazed at the dedication of these teachers and administrators who gave up a Saturday (and a beautiful one at that) to better their craft.

I loved my conversations throughout the day: talking to Mrs. Reuber about former students and understanding just how much she knows and cares about her students, thinking of ideas with Mrs. Nemo about how to reset our focus to make our students love reading, reconnecting with Mrs. McHenry about books and writer's notebooks, being reminded by Mrs. Winchell that it is always about putting students first, chatting with Mr. Waspe about ways we could connect the amazing things that are going on at Berry with the amazing things going on at our other schools, and all the other conversations I had throughout the day with other Lebanon teachers.

Penny Kittle was the keynote speaker of the day.  I also sat through two session where she talked about conferring and writing.  I have been looking through the notes that I took through her sessions and the notes are filled with brilliant nugget after brilliant nugget.  The two main pieces I will be taking away from her presentations are let the book do the work and volume.

Let the book do the work is such a simple idea.  It means if you really want a student to read and fall in love with reading, you have to find the right book for that student.  I know we have been reading some amazing books this year (Flora and Ulysses, The One and Only Ivan, Flotsam, and countless others) but I really want this to be the focus of the rest of my year.  I want to get that one book into the hands of the students that will make them fall in love and see the power of reading.

Volume...I will talk more about volume later this week.

These conversations and sessions were priceless and will only make me a better teacher.  Conferences like these recharge my batteries.  I hope the class is ready for this week, because I am going to be ready to go when that bell rings tomorrow morning.

Hope you all had a great weekend.