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Showing posts from June, 2014

Poetry Friday: Pitcher

It's Poetry Friday.  Today's link up is hosted at Check It Out . So I'm a little hooked on fantasy baseball.  One of my pitchers, Mat Latos, is back with the Reds.  Yep, I'm writing this in hopes of sending the power to him to strike out my son's players on the other team.  Oh, fantasy sports.   Pitcher The pitcher touches his hat looks left chin touches shoulder. The ball goes behind his back he stares at the hitter. He moves the ball to his glove and stares again. He winds sends the ball racing toward the batter. The batter swings but the ball smacks the catchers mitt. Strike! © Cathy L. Mere, 2014

A Teacher's Summer

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Today I'm joining a Slice of Life hosted by Two Writing Teachers.  Stop by for links to this amazing community of writers.  Today was my first day without school related responsibilities even though school ended nearly two weeks ago.  Since that time I've been packing my classroom as I'm switching to a new position next year and attending professional development meetings.  So this morning, I thought I'd stop for a cup of coffee at Starbucks in celebration of all the possibility in a day without a schedule.  The barista handed me my coffee and said, "You have the summer off now." Perhaps they noticed that I had actually had a few good nights of sleep since completing report cards, finishing end of year paperwork, and preparing things for the end of the year.  They know me well in there.  We laugh when I say, "No skim today as I need a high-test cup of coffee so I have energy for this day."  Sometimes they look at me and suggest, "Perhap

You Might Be a Hoarder If...

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It's Tuesday!  Today, and every Tuesday, Two Writing Teachers hosts The Slice of Life Challenge ( today's link ).  Thanks to everyone at Two Writing Teachers for establishing and supporting this amazing community of writers.   This week I spent my days moving from my first grade classroom to a small room I will be using as a home base while supporting primary readers.  I've been teaching more years than I care to admit; just a little over a quarter century.  Actually, that sounds worse than saying I've been teaching for 26 years.  I've taught everything from kindergarten to 6th grade, as well as worked as a Reading Recovery teacher and as a Literacy Coach.  Though I've held many positions, I've always been in the classroom for part of my day.  So, I've collected some stuff.  That's putting it mildly;  I've collected a lot of stuff. It took days to sort through everything, separating my materials from those belonging to the school.  I had

Slice of Life: Priorities

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Today I am participating in the Slice of Life Tuesday Challenge.  Thanks to Two Writing Teachers for hosting. Priorities I went into school this morning to start to move from my first grade classroom into a small room for reading intervention.  I'm excited about the change, but not as excited about figuring out what to do with all of the stuff I have collected.  I went in at 8 o'clock his morning and worked until it was well past dark.  After putting in over 12 hours, I had decided jumping back into Slice of Life could wait until next week.   Then I stopped by Kidblog and saw that Maggie had posted today.  Our class had discussed posting on Tuesdays over the summer since we enjoyed the month long challenge in March.  She had written a poem about the beach.  I decided if she could find time to write, I would too.  Thanks, Maggie, for reminding me of what is important. I'm going to follow Maggie's lead and write a poem about moving.   Moving Stacks of books