International Reading Association National Conference 2014- Heaven on Earth!!

Oh. My. Goodness.

I cannot even explain to you how excited, uplifted, motivated, re-energized (the list could go on) I feel! I just experienced my very first ever International Reading Association National Conference. It has absolutely been the BEST professional development I have been to thus far in my career.

I wish there was a way for me to capture the energy from the conference in a blog post, but I just don't think it would be possible and I would fail miserably if I tried. Being there, it was palpable. The conference was the perfect mix of professional sessions, networking, product-sampling, and author-meeting. I have never been this inspired and felt so supported to really reflect on my practices, refine my philosophy, and take the actions to improve my teaching. It was such an inspiration to be surrounded by so many highly respected researchers, professors, and educators who are passionate about literacy and children. And to top it off, the entire exhibit hall was filled with books- professional books, children's books, young-adult books- books everywhere! I mean really, it was heaven on earth!

My teammate and I were preparing a PowerPoint to show our students and I realized that the slides would work perfectly as a way for me to give you a little picture evidence of our trip. With all the information swirling around in my head right now, pictures are about all I can manage!

Here we go!

Because we are showing this to the kids, we called her 'Mrs. Pinnell.' :)

I'll address the alphabet issue in another post. It's a very interesting story. 

While standing in line for Dav Pilkey, I was able to get my book signed by another author, Marissa Moss!

Brod was so amazing! He even videoed a message just for our kids! He is truly a fabulous poet and he cares about kids. Check out his MUSE Project! He has vowed to write poems that hit content standards for grades K-8. It's pretty amazing. I'll do a separate post on that later. Here is the awesome video he made for our kids:

And that wasn't all! I didn't get any pictures, but we heard great speeches from Mary Pope Osborne, author of the popular Magic Tree House series, Debbie Diller, Dr. P. David Pearson, Dr. Tim Rasinski, and more!! It was a whirlwind!

Debbie Diller

Mary Pope Osborne

Tim Rasinski

Dr. P. David Pearson

My head is just spinning! I might come back and do some separate posts on some of the highlights from the conference later, but for now I'm just going to relish in the fact that I was able to have this amazing experience and relax before I'm back in my classroom tomorrow!

IRA 2014- an experience I will never forget!!