Analyzing What My Goals Really Are

August 1st!  Wow!  Summer seems like it just started but it is actually almost over.  Many of you have started back already.  It has been fun to watch your classrooms come back to life through Instagram and Facebook.

I am not there yet.

Actually, I have not even been back to school.  But there is a huge mess of school stuff in my spare bedroom and garage.  The mess is filled with materials purchased this summer, ideas I want to try out, new books to share, and materials for more parent engagement.  I need to go into school.

Yesterday a picture was posted on Instagram about our 2015 goals.

Hmm....

I sat at my kitchen table forever thinking about it.  There are goals in my head.  There are goals in my boxes of mess.  There are goals written all over my summer notes from reading and discussions.  But I can't keep up with 50 million goals.  What are my true goals for this year?

 After sitting for an extremely long time, I realized my goals could be broken down into a couple of words.  Here is what I posted yesterday:

But I thought about these words all day long.  What did I mean by them?  And how was I going to meet these goals?  How did the things I want to accomplish really fit into these words?

Engage

There are several different ideas that my building is trying out this year to help parents engage in their child's learning.
-Readbox--I will stand out at dismissal with this to get more books in the hands of our families
-Monthly Game Nights
-Daily pictures through social media about something that happened during the day

Balance

I am not sure how to accomplish this or if I am even successful with it.  But I want to keep working towards better balance with teaching, blogging, being a mom, wife, sister, friend....the list just goes on from here.

Give my best

One of my goals this year is to remember that I am giving my best but so is everyone else.  Before making judgements on others or getting annoyed with others, I want to remember that we are all just doing the best that we can.

Some of the things that I will give my best to:
-Implementing our new vocabulary ideas
-Implementing plans from our Reading Reflex book study
-Creating a culture of thinkers
-Making lessons hands on and connecting them to real life
-Creating engaging lessons during guided reading and math
-Implementing our RtI schedule

Be Mindful

For years I have been working towards paying attention to right now.  Teachers are lucky because we always have the end goal or standard in our head but those little kiddos keep pulling us back to what is going on right this second.  They are good little reminders to pay attention.
So I want to keep working towards enjoying the moment that I am in.

What about you?  What do you want to accomplish this year?