Ms. Vigna
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This week I’m helping launch a first grade readers’ workshop, so I mined my kindergarten resources for familiar reading goals from the Super Reader unit, also known as my favorite kindergarten Reading Unit of Study. Tomorrow, the first grade readers will get a plastic sheet protector to record the number of books they want to…
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It’s nearly time to return to school here in Massachusetts, so I’ve been busy prepping some PD for the amazing teachers in my building. Some of it is ideas overload, some of it is a review of the basics, and some of it is reflecting on our best practices. Just realized that’s totally my style:…
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This summer, I’m participating in some summer work focused on Cultivating Genius by Dr. Gholdy Muhammad. Our second Zoom discussion is next week, so I’m putting together my thoughts based on the assigned reading. I love this reflection question so much: How does this lesson help students see themselves or others? I used Canva to…
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Reading is a huge part of my life. It’s who I am. My car has a bumper sticker that says “read”, and I have MANY reading-themed graphic tees. So I was devastated when my brain wouldn’t let me read during the pandemic. I would try and then lose track after a few sentences. Eventually, I…
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Someone once doubted my ability to find the joy in teaching, and it was a very painful comment. How could they think that? Was my joy not enough? Or were the things I thought were joyful not obvious to an observer? With my joy-fidence rattled, I decided to infuse as much obviously, outwardly joyfulness into…
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Man, I really wanted to publish Volume 100 by the end of this school year. Turns out being a full-time, *first-time* kindergarten teacher and full-time coach was too much even for an overachiever like me. I don’t feel too bad though. I taught kids how to *read* this year (and even got them all to…
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One of my favorite parts of teaching in The Now is the art that we’ve created. From plays for our theatre to this stained glass window display, we’ve been creators. Creating has been a great form of expression and even leads to more writing and reading. What a colorful year! Here is this week’s roundup…
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Two summers ago, in The Before, I attended the Summer Poetry Institute hosted by The Poetry Foundation (PoFo) in Chicago. It was a glorious week of being immersed in poetic forms and devices. I learned and learned and learned and wrote and wrote and wrote. I’m embarrassed to admit that I learned a new-to-me literary…
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One of the main tenets of my teaching philosophy is that learning should be joyful. Not only do I want students to enjoy themselves, but I’ve seen how much deeper learning can be if it’s a joyful experience. But when I learned I’d be pivoting to the role of kindergarten teacher, I had some serious…
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Our beloved post office transformed into a theatre recently! To help build students’ background knowledge, we watched a video of a backstage tour of a theatre and I’ve been reading at least one picture book a week about theatre. We’ve been so inspired we even wrote our very first play about our shared reading text,…
A SEA OF TALK 