Tag Archives: Big Time Blogging Challenge 2016

Finding the Flow

community, learning, thinking out loud, work, writing,

Inspired by Donna Donner’s post 12 Month Human at Four O’Clock Faculty which I found on Twitter via Tamara Letter:

I write a fair amount about living a life outside the traditional workforce. One lesson I continue to learn about living this life is that it flows and living in rather than fighting the flow is the way to move smoothly and calmly even through the rapids.

I was the road warrior in June: just take a look at my reading log. I hit a high of 13 books because I discovered The 39 Clues series on Audible. Each book takes about 4-1/2 hours of listening, which just happened to be the average length of each of my car trips. Every day was planned to the minute as each task had to be completed on time if events and trips were going to be successful. There was no time for procrastination. Within that strict regimen there was “work” and “life” as even my garden was part of the to do list. Weeding had to be done before I was gone for ten days. That meant a daylong marathon with shovel and cart. My husband shepherded me inside at dusk, handing me two ibuprofen as I walked up the steps.

And now…it’s July, and for the first time in many years, I am home. No traveling, no training, even very little “work.” My mother was worried that I was going to be bored and suggested I could use the free time to house clean. I’m thinking more Scratch programming and Raspberry Pi exploration along with early morning hours in the garden and long afternoons floating in the pool with a book.

Donna Donna got to the heart of my life when she wrote that her teaching life is “entwined with all the other cycles of my life.” She goes on:

As my summer rolls on I will honor my love of learning, my love for my family, my love for my profession and my curiosity of the world. My life cycle flows with this balance all year long. You see, I am a 12-month mother. I am a 12-month wife. I am a 12-month friend.  I am a 12-month teacher. I am a 12-month human. I never take a vacation from any of those parts of me. Some parts just come out a little stronger at times but all contribute to balancing me as a whole.

I think the struggle is figuring out which part is stronger at any time as I tend to want to always focus on the work I do for others first. I resonated with Donna sitting on the porch with her hummingbirds–mine are at their height right now, buzzing me as I head out to fill the feeders–reviewing her notes from a summer workshop. For me, it would be planning ahead for my fall courses and events.

Then, I sat down at the laptop this morning prepared to put in a full morning of work and realized I didn’t have to…I could browse Twitter and that led to Tamara’s tweet and Donna’s post and some writing. It’s a different kind of work this personal reflection and community connection, and who knows where it might lead. The emails will wait; the preparation for an October workshop will wait; it’s time for the focus to be on my own learning and growing and flowing.

 

 

Summer Reading List

blogging, books, reading

I really did not plan to blog every day in July, but I got a good start and then discovered the Big Time Blogging Challenge 2016 at the Big Time Literacy blog written by literacy coach Michelle Brezek. I may not always follow her theme for the day but since I just wrote up my reading list, I can follow right along today!

My list is varied: fiction, non-fiction and professional:

I’ll start with what I’ve already read since the beginning of July: Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. A classic adventure story with a conflict between good and evil at the heart of the story. The heroine is a 12-year-old girl who discovers her own magic and, with the support of friends and family, saves the day.

I’m a LibraryThing member and am doing a couple challenges. John Steinbeck is the focus of the American Author challenge for July, and I’ll be reading East of Eden and Journal of a Novel: The East of Eden Letters, a series of short daily letters the Steinbeck wrote to his editor each day as he wrote the novel. Current events are the focus of the July non-fiction challenge, and I’m doing two books that are part of the One Richmond, One Book initiative at the University of Richmond where I serve as an adjunct professor. Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stephenson was last year’s book. This year, it’s Evicted:   Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond.

As I prepare for a keynote and workshop about blended learning in early August, I’ll be finishing Go Blended!: A Handbook for Blended Technology in School by Liz Arney and Blended: Using Disruptive Innovation to Improve Schools by Michael Horn. The school district I’m working with loaned me a few books they’ve read in past years including The Art of Coaching: Effective Strategies for School Transformation by Elena Aguilar.

I’ve been moving VERY slowly through a biography of Marjorie Harris Carr, wife of Archie Carr, the man who started the sea turtle conservation program. Marjorie was an environmentalist in her own right but struggled with the bias against women in science.

Also on the list:

And, I have two boxes of books coming to me that I shipped home from Denver. I can’t list all those titles but I suspect I’ll work a few in.

And…I forgot…I did a digital checkout of The Cracked Spine: A Scottish Bookshop Mystery that is waiting on my Kindle.