As teachers we are up to our necks busy.  We leave home before it is fully light outside and often pick dinner up on the way home.  We miss our kids while we work and can’t wait to see them at the end of the day.  So what is a professional development organization that wants to support teachers to do?  We know that getting together with other teachers and sharing best practices builds our expertise and increases our job satisfaction.  We want our LMWP events to help experts stay in the profession, not add to the work overload that draws many teachers to hang up their lesson planners for good. 

With these thoughts in mind, we held our first Family Literacy Picnic last Thursday.  With our families, we ate brats, grilled burgers, and watched our children play at Riverside Park.  We did a little writing.  We asked our kids if they wanted to write with us.  We strengthened our community, getting to meet the spouses and little ones about whom we often write and talk (saying all good things, of course).

We shared the ways that we as teachers use literacy to keep our relationships at home thriving.  Here’s some of what we wrote:

• We talk all the time.  
• My son writes books and thank-you notes. 
• We read before bed. 
• We like to draw and tell stories about pictures.
• Frequently we read the same books and when we’re done, we talk about the portions we enjoyed most.
• We email friends to ask them over for dinner.
• We read aloud in the evenings.
• We write little stick-notes to say “I love you” or “Hope you sleep well tonight”
• Reading books gives us time to cuddle and talk.
• We write a blog to keep our family and friends updated about our lives.
• Grimm’s original fairy tales have been the nightly stories of love, horror, magic, and mystery this summer.
• We read picture books in the morning, all day, before bed.
  
  • (and my favorite entry in the under 10 year old writer category:)
• Buck Wilder's Small Twig Hiking and Camping Guide helps me.