Great Blog Posts

• How To Conquer Your To Do List attracted me because my summer is slowly slipping away and I really need to get organized so I accomplish some desperately needed tasks before I am back to the mad world of full schedules. I have Evernote on my iPad, so I started using it, and even downloaded it to my phone. I'll get back to you on whether or not I love it yet.
• I found a kindred spirit at Read, Write, Reflect. I live her posts on conferences she has attended this summer. She did some summer reading workshops and book clubs for her students! I especially loved her post on reading logs. This is a must- read blog, for sure. 
• This post, about The Match Box Diary, got me thinking about kids and journals and fun ways to record history. It would be a fun book to read and do an activity on family history. You could use this idea in the classroom too. I can imagine making 10 matchboxes and then each month, choosing something to go into the matchbox to represent a special memory from that month. It would also make a great memory for a family reunion. Grandparents could prepare 10 matchboxes and throughout the reunion kids could pick a match box and listen to the story told that goes with it. Matchboxes are not that common anymore, but you could make your own origami match boxes. This could also be a fun thing to add to our Star Student presentations.
• This post reminded me that I need to do more writing. 
• In my school we have a wonderful program that truly gives kids a great foundation to be great decodes and fluent readers. Every class has a rotating list parent volunteers that come in and read with children each week. We don't do that so much in Gr. 3 because they are usually quite fluent by then. However, 
This post, from There's a Book For That, got me thinking that perhaps I should still be having volunteers do that - but to with the regular "decodables", with regular picture books linked to our learning. Hmmmmmmmm......
• And this has nothing to do with books, but Lara's post reminded me that the really important things in life are often fleeting and can suddenly be taken away.