great week

I sent the following in an email to Dar. I want to share it with our blog. It's got some very "inside my head" sections, but we'll live with that.

I have had such a thought-productive week. Last summer I became aware of the English Companion Ning. I must have joined it and then done nothing more with it.

This summer for some reason I bumped into it again, tried to join, discovered I had already.... So then I saw the ECNing is having its first ever Webstitute (via Elluminate) on 13 and 14 July. So I signed up to "attend." It was excellent. Mostly the speakers were about technology and connections using the web with students. I learned and learned and learned.

I created a second Twitter account for educational use. Currently I'm using it to follow some of the education people I was already following; I added some people I met at the webstitute. One of the wonderful characteristics of many outstanding teachers is that they are so generous with their time and wisdom.  In her keynote presentation, Laura Nicosia talked about Diigo and described how she finds it useful. and now I am crazy about it. We are following each other on Twitter. 

Sunday I'm joining a 2-week-long online discussion of a book co-written by Releah Cossett Lent (who wrote that cool book Dar also liked) and Jimmy Santiago Baca called "Adolescents on the Edge."

One of the most valuable aspects of all this online professional feasting is that it removes all the horrible, depressing parts of our job from my immediate concern, and it spurs me to have ideas and questions and joyful anticipation of the coming school year.

I am going to protect that feeling/attitude fiercely when we return to school and have our trainings and information and dictates from the great omniscient bureaucrats. I am going to let that part of the job lightly intersect with my being but not penetrate. I am going to protect my teaching joy fiercely. The feeling is too wonderful to let it be shut down.

So I'm working a bit on "protection strategies."  I think I must sound way over the edge, but I'm not going to go back and edit for clarity. We can talk. That's quicker than re-writing about how I feel.