I am so excited about my plan to reach out to schools in my area that may need full-time teachers or even substitute teachers. I bought my custom-made business cards and return address labels from Vistaprint a while ago. Today, I bought address labels and 6x9 white envelopes so that I can mail promotional materials to schools that I think match my teaching philosophy and would make a great match for employment. My plan includes sending a tailored letter, resume, and business card to one school per business day. I will be posting updates.

I found this beauty on Facebook. I like two things about it: (1) The way the teacher highlights the book she is currently reading with the class and (2) tips for being kind always to others even if they are not your friends. "Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible." - ​Dalai Lama XIV

​At my current school, students read two novels per year, due to the time constraint of only having 2.5 hours per day to teach academics. For the first novel, the students listened to the audio version of Number the Stars by Lois Lowry while answering focus questions in their reading notebook. We took breaks to discuss what they book meant to them. They absolutely loved it! Every day all they wanted to do was listen to this book being read aloud and to discuss how the characters responded to the difficult situation having to be brave in the face of The Holocaust and WWII.
When I saw this post on Facebook, on Create-abilities Teacher Community, which shared a Story Time YouTube channel, Storytime with Mrs. Cole, that shares books read aloud for children to watch, it made me think that a daily story time is also appropriate for 5th grade readers. 
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​I found this gem on a Facebook site I follow, ELA in the Middle 6-8: "Start each period with a short writing task. Ask them questions about themselves. It's a great way to learn about students and begin developing relationships without sacrificing content." - Keri Barn, ELA in the Middle 6-8 Member.
I love this advice. A middle school coworker used to do this EVERY DAY during the Zoom days of the pandemic. And the kids really loved sharing a part of themselves in the classroom. I think this strategy will work well in a 5th grade classroom as well. Relationships really are so important!

Today, was a difficult day in the teacher mine. 8 out of 21 students were absent and the students had a lot of energy. I don't know if it's the pandemic or if the students at this school are absent frequently, but having almost the half the class out for almost 1 week is very hard. It almost feels like I am planning curriculum separately for each of the absent students. Each day they don't return, I take out more and more of the missing assignments they must complete because it's just too much for one student to complete on top of all the other work they must complete.
Because there's limited time in the general studies classroom (about 2.5 hours per day not including recess), I had already created a white folder for each student that I use to pass out all copies for the day and for each student to turn in their work. Now, I have a red folder for unfinished assignments. So now, each day that a student is absent, I simply remove the daily copies from the white folder and put them in the student's red folder. 
This new system seems to be working well, although I don't ever remember working this hard to keep on top of assignments being turned in! My current school is technology free. (I used to think that Google Classroom took away something important from the learning, but now I miss it so much!)