Lately I have been thinking about many positive remarks that I have found reading newer websites online. There is a lot out there about sending positive thoughts out to the universe to manifest what you want.
As we approach St. Patrick's Day, I want to make a couple of remarks to the universe. First of all, today was the one year anniversary of my sister-in-law's passing, and I wish her the best. She has fewer problems and eternal peace, something to look forward to for people still toiling away here on earth. Second, I have been thinking about what luck really means. I think I can do more in my life to positively manifest things that are so important to me. That said, I have spent years letting excuses hold me back from going after what I really want. I have spent more time on that than focusing more energy on getting what I want. Remember what you want is something only you can define. As you grow as a person and experience the joys of aging, things that seemed important when you were in your teens and twenties will seem less important now. That's the stage I am at in life - it used to be a show called Thirtysomething. If you find yourself in that stage of life right now, you probably know what I mean. In a casual world where things are only important for a nanosecond, it's always a good time to focus on what is important to you. Someone said that you should know if you are settling for something, accepting less than what you know you deserve. I believe we all have so many things to be thankful for, but it feels like human nature to want more. I am looking for finding likeminded people like me who want to earn a healthy side income to share ideas. Guest blogging can be a powerful marketing tool, not just pinning parties and cross promotions. If you ever need this lucky writer to lend my pen to your site, just let me know. It could be you have a cause or a different kind of business, but it's worth talking about. Thanks for stopping in to this new section of my blog! It's important to celebrate life's little triumphs when you can. This week, I reached a smile milestone of ten units sold for one of my favorite products. I created this lovingly over a week or two and used it with positive responses from my own students. I have tweaked it and added to it over the last few months.
Side Note: The product was marketed for about four to five months. Another product I created only about 3 weeks ago is already two sales away from reaching the big Ten mark. Just goes to show you can never totally forecast sales. That's weird because years ago I used to write articles about forecasting, and now I am more focused on my own products making me about $15 per month. I like both kinds of sales - slow and steady and more sporadic! Side Note: I have been thinking a lot lately about the time required on the front end to create products for sale on Teacher's Notebook and TeachersPayTeachers.com. What I like about these sites is that the prices are pretty reasonable and I can always find something I need to augment my own plans. Why didn't this business model catch on more than 5 years ago? I am excited to announce that I have two new mini units just in time for Dr. Seuss' birthday. At my school, we are celebrating Read Across America on March 10. Whether you are doing it March 3 or March 10 or some other day, you can enjoy these mini units now or any time of year.
The Dr. Seuss Meets Eric Carle unit encourages students to write an adventure story. The Spring is Sprung! unit encourages you and your students to write a poem with rhyming couplets and made-up words. Both units are opportunities to use content words and help students remember what they mean. Enjoy! Having never been to LEGOLAND or watched any Lego movies, having only bought my daughter one Lego set ever, I wonder what we have to learn from this empire.
It's fun to find other writing resources that will help other teachers.
Check out this free writing download from Amy Lemons. She is one of the top sellers on TPT and has been in the biz for a long time. http://stepintosecondgrade.blogspot.com/2012/06/writers-workshop-freebie.html Well, it's time to take apart my best selling product and share parts with the world for free. Expository writing is essential for working in a digital economy. Today, I'm also happy to announce I'm taking my little WWW to the next level. Now, teachers around the world can enjoy some free downloads without having to scour through TeachersPayTeachers.com! That's because I updated to a paid site through Weebly.com. MyCommon Core ELA "Polar Bears" Expository Writing Unit was fully tested in my classroom last fall. The kids were able to fully access all materials to their best ability, and the only materials that were too hard for them were the Polar Bear fact sheets and sorts, principally because the science terms exceeded their reading levels. Here are some free previews and downloads of my materials from this unit! How to Build a Simple Expository Writing Unit: 1. Pick your theme: Example "Polar Bears" 2. Build the lesson plan to fit the scope and sequence of your state or school district, also called your academic plan. What Common Core standards will your unit address? How will you focus instruction on specific grade-level content through targeted activities? <--Here is mine from this Expository unit! 3. Decide how you will motivate students and give them an objective and simple explanation of the concept. One way is through a motivational poster. I also created Woodchuck Writing Workshop dollars and mini-posters for a different writing unit.
My K-2 darlings would have a hard time understanding how writing can help you share a part of your soul with the world. Writing is a powerful form of communication, even in this era of Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
Ultimately, isn't this what we want our students to be able to do -- to use writing for whatever purpose makes them happy or helps them accomplish their goals? Today was one of the best days hands down I have ever had as a teacher. It was Valentine's Day, granted, and my students were brimming with feelings of unabashed joy and love for their teachers. These are the moments we teachers live for, and they get us through the more difficult days. If I would write anything, I would share with the world how each day can be unexpected. I would say I was touched by so many smiles today everywhere I went, not just school. Smiles that reassure you can be found at the doctor's office, at the gas station, at the gym, at Starbucks, and everywhere in between. These people were a huge part of my day, and I was sure to smile back and wish them Happy Valentine's Day. Thanks, perfect strangers and friends! I read somewhere that your mind directs how you think and greatly influences how your day will go. I used that advice today, and it was terrific! Mindfulness is a great tool for writers. I was reading a post on another teacher's website, and that got me interested in meditation for mindfulness. If you can help your kids use writing to relax, they can really use writing as a powerful vehicle for introspection. Maybe they aren't at the point where they want to blog about it, but they can record happiness, sadness, fear, excitement, regrets, and all other emotions that make us human. The more I read what other people are writing, the more I feel like we have the power to really change our reality and unlock the parts of ourselves we have been holding back because we were limiting ourselves with weakness, lack of self-esteem, doubt, and even fear. Life is too short to let fear prevent you from becoming the fullest version of yourself! Here's to writing and working out who the real you is that is begging to be released! We have been hitting expository writing hard in my class for the past few months. Sometimes, I have to stop and force myself to take a step back. You have to remind yourself that your students can practice this skill on their level, even when writing only a few words. The fact that the students have been excited about all the expository subjects I have chosen, including polar bears, ants, and woodchucks, is great. Now, we are just trying not to run out of gas as summer approaches. This is when it becomes crucial to change things up and dig deep. Don't let the kids lose that intensity. Don't wear yourself out!
We are seeing lots of gains this year but still that hesitation to write. I am looking for new ideas and going back to word cards and brilliant pictures as ways to encourage the kiddos to write. I am renewing the focus on oral language. A recent sentence center that I made was beyond the reach of some because they could not read the sentences before attempting to write their own. Do you like sentence frames? How do you make relevant sentence frames that early readers can read if they don't yet read the words that are the subject of your writing prompt of the week? This is a question that ESE teachers and others with struggling students can wrestle with until the cows come home. We always err on the side of repetition, repetition, and repetition. But we also have to find new ways to get kids excited! If you wrote 250 words a day on your blog, do you think it would build traffic to your teacher educational products website like TeachersPayTeachers? I have been writing content online for years. As far back as 8 years ago, I remember the advice -- and it's pretty common advice -- you must update your blog almost daily to keep traffic inbound. Ideally, you also want people to comment on your blog.
The bigger question is how do you get the traffic coming to your blog first. There is that dying breed called content marketing, and then there are the various forms of paid advertising. As a teacher, I am not much for advertising. I am looking for different ways to turn this writing blog into a go-to resource for teachers. If you have a blog that you would like me to comment on, please feel free. I would love to share information with you and learn what you have to offer. Although my niche is currently expository writing, this teacher's writing blog will expand into other types of writing. This area of writing was a natural choice for me because I have worked for years as a freelance writer. Expository writing -- I mean when you work online -- involves how to tell the information in the most concise way without allowing people to click away from your page. Fortunately, we don't have to put that kind of pressure on our elementary students in the early grades. Although I am used to writing 300 to 500 words, I am enjoying the challenge of blogging again, much more focused on improving the profession. If I sell a few more lesson plans on TPT, that's awesome too! :) Today, I was looking for other blogs and websites to visit and recommend as a resource and I came across Writingfix.com. I am starting here. http://writingfix.com/traits_primary.htm Here is where you can read about a 13-year-old writing project from Nevada that doubles as a website where you can find writing information on many subjects. Since it is teacher-friendly, you absolutely must go back more than once. Most definitely, my starting point will be reading and reviewing books other teachers are talking about. While Nevada seems so very far away from Florida, it is also part of the USA, and so there's bound to be some great advice. TeachersPayTeachers is a good starting point, but reading teacher blogs and other sites has really expanded my horizons about what's really out there. Teacher-to-teacher education is fun. I also celebrated a comment today. I was glad to read that one of my early customers had kids who loved my unit! Thanks to that fellow teacher! |