Five for Friday: ILA week

For the first time, I am linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for five for Friday.  Here are 5 random things about my last week.

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Both Little Girl and I took trips last week. I went to the International Literacy Association conference in St. Louis to learn more about literacy. She went to Grandma's to make peacock hand prints and feed cows.  We both had awesome times. While I missed her like crazy, I was also glad to have a couple of days to socialize like pre-kid days.

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This was my first experience being at a large, international conference.  One of the things that surprised me the most was all the free goodies.  Scholastic had a large breakfast where we got a red bag with 5 books.  The authors of these books spoke about their favorite teacher.

See Jewell Parker Rose?  I now want everything that she has written.  She is that gifted with words.  I also want to give her a hug and tell her everything is gonna be okay.  I was in TEARS listening to her story.  She is absolutely amazing.

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Some of the speakers at the conference were okay, some were ugg, and some were amazing.  I was most blown away by Shiza Shahid.  I had not even heard of her before this conference.  Again, she has lived through so many things but has turned tragedy into opportunity again and again.

Maybe you have heard of Malala Yousafzai?  The girl shot by the Taliban on the bus for speaking up about girl's education?  Shiza is the one that runs her Malala fund.  She also has a passion for education and women's lives that just pushes others into action.

One thing she said really stuck with me.  I don't know the exact words but it was basically to choose one passion and make a difference with that one area.  Don't spend $20 on this charity and 1 hour for this one.  Really pick one and be the superhero for that cause. 

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I also got to hear some educational gurus-- Stephanie Harvey in particular was FANTASTIC.  That makes me super happy as I've been her fan for years.  I'm planning a whole bunch of posts sharing some of the ideas that I learned.  So if you are a teacher, start following or come back this week!  If you aren't a teacher, don't worry.  I will add some non-educational posts too.

What would you like to hear about?  My trip?  What I learned?  The speakers?  Should I share it all in a week or spread it out to one post a week? 

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Totally unrelated to ILA is my random cell phone troubles.  At the beginning of June, I switched carriers to Cricket Wireless.  I heard they were bought by AT&T and so had AT&T coverage for super cheap.  My husband and I pay $70 a month with taxes and fees.  For that cost, we get unlimited talk, unlimited texts, 2.5MB of fast data, and unlimited slow data.  We have been pleased with the service.

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The catch is the phone.  You have to buy your phone outright or put it on a crazy payment plan.  (Although you can also bring any AT&T phone over to Cricket since they are on the same network.)  At first I went with the ZTE Overture II since it was free after rebate.  I didn't have any real problems with it, though I thought the camera could be a lot better.  Then, one day, no one could hear me on the phone.  I restarted the phone and it went back to working.

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This week though, the power button broke.  You don't really know how essential a power button is until it's not working.  I downloaded an app that switched the control of the screen to the volume button.  I was still afraid the battery would die though.  While there is a manufacturer warranty, I decided it was more trouble than it was worth.  So now I have a Galaxy Grand Prime. Hopefully it lasts more than 2 months! 

Little Girl's Favorite Books

I don't use my daughter's name online.  Instead, I call her "Little Girl" or "Monkey Girl" or another cute name like that.  Anyway, she just turned 2 1/2 and these are some of her favorite books.

Tails by Matthew Van Fleet

Monkey Girl knows all the animals in this book (even the odd ones like pangolin) and keeps finding fun details like how the tiger is biting the alligator on the last page. Really anything by Matthew Van Fleet is a hit.  We also have Lick!, Munch!, and Fuzzy Yellow Ducklings. These books are interactive with plenty of tabs and flaps.  For the most part she takes good care of these books but she demolished Munch!

Press Here by Herve Tullet

This is another example of being in love with an author that I didn't even know existed until we started reading toddler books!  Press Here is also an interactive book but it doesn't have tabs to pull or flaps to open.  Instead, it gives "commands" to the reader like to press the yellow dot.  After the reader does it (on the next page), something magical happens.  Even though I know that the "magic" will happen even if you don't follow the directions, I sometimes hold my breath to see if it worked.  We've read Mix it up! and I am Blop! at the library-- they are great also.

Brown Bear by Bill Martin, Jr. (illustrated by Eric Carle)

Seriously, have you heard anything as sweet as a 2 year old reading this book to herself?  Makes me melt EVERYTIME.  She has had this book memorized for close to a year and still will read it to herself quite often.  She also requests this one to read together.  We have the Baby Bear book and have checked out Polar Bear and Panda Bear but Brown Bear holds a special place in my heart.  

Race You to Bed by Bob Shea

We picked this book up at a close-out bookstore because my husband thought it was so cute.  It is cute and it is even cuter to see them read it most nights before bed.  Plus, how much fun is it to go "all around a goat to bed"?  I haven't fallen in love with the other Bob Shea books but maybe I haven't given them a chance.

Fourteen Bears by Evelyn Scott

This is a book with some history.  My oldest brother checked this out from my hometown library when he was little.  From that point on, we loved this book.  My mom said that we had it checked out to us from the time he was 2 until I was 7 (and that's a feat since he is 7 years older than me!).  Years later, my mom checked into buying a copy for us.  It was out of print with copies running hundreds of dollars.  That hometown library had "lost" their only copy (or someone sold it for hundreds of dollars???)  In 2005, they reprinted this book and my mom got us all copies.  It is again out of print and is currently priced at "from $85".  Little Girl has decided that she loves this book but I worry every time we read it that it will get ripped to shreds.  We both love this book- it is about a Daddy Bear and Mother Bear and their 12 little baby bears.  They have all kinds of fun.  Makes me want to be a bear who lives in a hollow tree, eats flavored honey and swims with fishes.  

*Sigh*

This post is LONG!  And I didn't even get started on One Fish, Two Fish or Five Little Monkeys or . . . Volume 2 will need to come later!