Early Learning Excellence!

As a working mom and principal, I’m rarely home.

The honest truth is that I would like to think that because of how much I truly value education and opportunities for kiddos, that I spend an enormous amount of time with my own boys teaching them foundational skills and reading to them every night.  The truth is, I don’t.


I don’t always have the time.
I don’t always have the energy.
Sometimes I hand my boys my phone.
Sometimes I allow the TV to engage them during dinner.


However, I’ve been extremely lucky to have an amazing team behind me, ensuring that their needs are met.  On a recent family trip, that became incredibly obvious.

As we were driving down to Islamorada in my truck, my five year old spent part of the trip counting to 100, rhyming words, asking questions, asking us to quiz him on letter sounds in words... he wanted us to interact with him with what he learned this summer.

You see, he has been a part of an incredible program offered by Indian River County called, Step into Kindergarten.  Through generous donations, grants, and local support our incoming title-one kindergartners are given an opportunity for a summer learning experience to prepare them for entering school.  I was absolutely blown away by the growth the kiddos made at VBE as a principal and lead learner, but it hit even harder when I was able to watch my own child leave this summer as an emergent reader.

I want every single child to come into elementary school feeling this confident, proud, and eager to share what they are learning.  I’m so thankful to live in a community that values this, that realizes funding programs like STEP into K, will lead to future success for our children.

Thank you Karen Malits for organizing this, monitoring it, and for ensuring our kiddos are given opportunities to find success before entering Kindergarten!

Thank you Cynthia Falardeau for being an incredible asset to our district, your devotion to our students is something that I value and treasure. You are one of the reasons why our District has and will remain successful!

Thank you Brooke Flood, for organizing and running an incredible pre-K program!  Our families rave about the learning and opportunities given to their children that set them up for outstanding results!

On a proud principal note, we were lucky enough to have two and a half classes of students from my school alone participate in the program.  Over 40 students at Vero Beach Elementary will enter our learning environment ready to take on the challenges and rigor!  Our Little Indians are ready to thrive!

Thank you to all the sponsors, donors, and grants that make programs like this available to our kiddos.

Your investment in our community doesn’t go unnoticed or unappreciated.


STEP into K

5 Steps to Increase Self-Care as a Principal.

We've all seen the leaders that pride themselves on the, "celebration of busy."  Those who come early, stay late, and share the chaos of the day and late hours they have put in at work, with the world.

That was me. I wore "busy" like a badge.

I think we all perpetuate this notion that busy is better, as we drive across Florida and see the school buildings in the dark, with the administration and educator spots still filled, using this to measure how hard we work to maintain success in our buildings. The reality is, I do tend to over-value the idea that being busy, staying later, and over-committing is something that should be recognized and respected.  As a principal, I have made the vow to discontinue this practice and I will start celebrating the self-care of myself and my staff.  I noticed as the years in administration added on, so have the pounds, caffeine, missed meals, and deflated dreams of getting to the gym.  This summer, however, I decided to re-commit, to myself.

I can't pour from an empty cup and my family and I deserve for my cup to be filled with self-love!

My job is not getting any easier, however, here is how I built self-care into my daily routine.   

1. Practice "Unplugging" Daily.

I have become a fan of the digital morning detox!

If you're anything like me,  your inbox is filled in the morning with emails and updates.  Add on social media notifications and it can feel like you're drowning before you have even fully opened your eyes.  My old practice was to lie in bed and scroll through the emails, answer the ones that seemed urgent, plan my day based on my calendar, and set priorities for what needs to be accomplished.  This usually led to me scrolling through social media, and before I know it, thirty minutes has been wasted.  All of this took place before my feet ever met the carpet next to my bed.  The first hour of the day sets your intentions for the rest of your day.  I'm working on not plugging in for the first half hour using this time to practice gratitude, stretch, and walk the dog.  Grabbing a cup of coffee before even considering touching my phone has been quite the daunting task, but I have found this to be the most rewarding practice of self-care.  What I've learned is, I deserve this time to set my focus.  The emails can wait.

2. Engage In Daily Exercise Or Mental Breaks

I must admit, I was in denial of how out of shape I was.  After finally committing to joining a boxing gym, I have found that I'm much more alert and energized throughout the day.  Start small and set your intention for what works for you. I realized that I was letting excuses get in the way of practicing self-care.  Once I got realistic about when and where I could squeeze in workouts, I found that everything worked itself out.  

3. Enjoy Rest And Solitude

I'm not a particularly patient person.  Even in moments where I should be relaxing, I find my head begins to spin with things that are not relevant.  Anxiety for the future gets the best of me.  I found that "enjoying rest" was much harder for me than it should be.  This has been where I've asked my family to help.  When we take mini-vacations, stay-cations, or extended time off; I've asked them to remind me to stay present.  When I start to focus on school, they are there to pull me back into living in the moment with them.  I've learned that I need to ask for help where I have areas to work on.

4. Extend My Professional Learning Network

I found that so many ideas that I wanted to implement on my campus have already been done on other campuses across the nation.  Instead of starting from scratch, by building up my personal learning network, I get support and resources from other administrators.  This has saved me so much time!  

My question for my readers is:  Why are you still not on Twitter?  What is stopping you from joining other passionate lead learners across the country?  Joining Twitter and participating in educational chats has led to some of the best professional development that I've ever been a part of.   Once you find your tribe, find other ways to connect and grow your network. These are a few groups on twitter that I would highly recommend you following. 

Twitter:

#leadupchat

#kidsdeserveit

#Principalsinaction

#leadLAP

#momsasprincipals

@schoolLeadersFL

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/principalprinciplesleadership/

5. Encourage Self-Care Of Your Staff

Here it is.  By celebrating my self-care, I encourage others to do the same.  It gives permission to the entire staff to get healthier, mindful, positive, and energized.  We all need the reminders that we need to fill our cups when we are constantly filling that of others.  

We will be starting a  @verobeachelem self-care tweet!  Summer is halfway over and I want my staff to share how they are enjoying their time.  I plan on purchasing a pedicure certificate and raffling it off to our winner!!!!

In the end, by writing this and committing to this I will be able to hold myself accountable to the small changes that will lead to me being a healthier, more productive, and well-balanced leader of the VBE VIBE.