My Life's To-Do List: Summer Projects Day 1

It's summer. I am on summer 'vacation' and I totally want to go back to work. I'm ready to start in my new classroom with my new students, teaching new material. And then I think about how little sleep I got my first year of teaching and I return to summer-mode with lightning speed. This year will be like my first year all over again, with hopefully a bit more sleep. A bit. So, since my summer is officially half over, I thought I'd work on my summer projects list. I don't have a physical list (though now that I say that I have the sudden ~~OCD~~ urge to make one), but regardless I have things I want to do with my summer. All year long I think, "I'll definitely have to do that this summer", and now it's half over and I've done none of those things...if I can even remember them. All I know is that there were a lot of crafty things and a lot of organization I had planned. If only I could remember what they were...

(I love Wordle!)

So, in an effort to jog my memory, I've decided to do one "Summer Project" a day for as long as I can/don't get overwhelmed with it. (I am SO not good at setting 30-day challenges or even 3-day challenges because I instantly feel that pressure, the stress that says, "you skipped a day and now your challenge is ruined!") So it's my "however-many-days-I-can summer projects challenge that includes crafty things and organization". Long title...I'll work on that. Acronym maybe? "HMDICSPCTICRAO"

Or not.

Project #1: Organize all of the massive amounts of information I got at my Problem-Based Learning Teacher's Conference in Aurora, IL (July 11-15).

First let me say that I loved this conference, learned from this conference, and laughed at this conference...but the organization of the papers drove me crazy! We got this box, that actually had three-ring binder things inside, but they were thoroughly ignored. Instead, crammed inside the box, were seven separate books that were specially printed at some copy store, probably costly, and altogether annoying! The entire conference we had to flip through the "orange book, no wait, maybe it's in the purple book". All along I kept saying, if only it was loose paper neatly tab divided in a 2" binder, now that would be heavenly!

So I made it happen. Tonight, while Mark watched a movie and Charlie slept, I organized. This organization cost me $2.99. For the tabs. Cheapest summer project so far (especially since it's the first). I removed all the staples with a nail file (my staple remover is at school) and cut all of the beautiful (probably costly) books in half. Hey, they should have consulted an organizer before printing(:

And this is what the end product looks like now. It will fit perfectly next to my other 2" binders in my classroom that hold every note I ever took in an English class (no really, I kept them all...even from high school- and I've used them often to teach, well not often, but a few times).