Summer Mindset


In August of 2016, my family, along with my parents and my brother and his family spent an amazing vacation in Rhode Island. The picture you see here was our view every morning from the home that we rented. It was always a breathtaking start to our day.

Typically, conversations in the teacher office at this time of year centers around what vacation plans people have. Our family will probably get away to RI again, but our summer will also be filled with bringing my son to college visits (open houses), taxiing my daughter back and forth to orchestra camp, lots of fly fishing, and a number of other day trips with the family.

But as I wrap up my 23rd year of teaching, I am also feeling like I still have work to do. For some strange reason, the end of the school year snuck up on me. And now that I have taken care of my end of the year paperwork, I am slowly transitioning to summer mode.

This past year provided me with great opportunities to explore the world of mathematics. My work with the NYS Master Teacher Program and the encounters on Twitter have really shaped the way I work with math and with my math students. As a result, my summer mindset will have a big math component to it.

Will I be taking advantage of sleeping in, breakfast on the deck, not ironing, not making lunches, staying up late, and the many other perks of being off for the summer? Absolutely. But I am also looking forward to using the summer time to recharge and continue to support my growth mindset and playing with math. 

As has been the case this year, I'll be keeping in contact with my many sources of inspiration on the Math Twitter Blogosphere, and I will continue to play with GeoGebra, Desmos, and Google Apps. I'll be satisfying my own math curiosity and developing activities for the 2017-2018 school year. 

But first, I think my canoe and fly rods are calling me...

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