The last four days, I had the privilege to attend a conference of a lifetime! Most would think that a teacher conference would be boring and filled with lots of learning. It was indeed filled with of LOTS of learning but it was far from boring. In fact it was a PARTY!!!! I was blessed to go with the support of my school and with a colleague of mine. We had an amazing time listening, learning, and bouncing ideas off of each other. I come back from this conference feeling inspired and full of great ideas for this school year. I was also able to meet some of my favorite "famous" teachers who I follow on social media. I was totally "teacher crushing"! I cannot wait to share these things with my team and school. Here are a few pictures from our incredible four days in Dallas, TX.
Jenny and I catching an early flight to head out to GYTO in Dallas.
The conference was held at the beautiful Gaylord Texan Hotel.
Even during the summer teachers have a good time especially at the water park!
Night one waiting for opening session. Like I said it was a PARTY!!!!
Night one was INCREDIBLE!!! The keynote speaker was Rachel Hollis, and she was nothing short of amazing! Her stories had us all laughing and crying, while at the same time inspiring us to follow after all of our dreams, especially as women. If you are reading this and have not read her books I highly encourage you to! Well thats a wrap for a long but amazing 1st day at GYTO.
Day 2:
Day two started out with a bang by listening to Wade and Hope King speak and again inspire us all to follow our dreams and make the magic happen in our classrooms each day. If you haven't heard of Hope and Wade they are husband and wife teachers from The Ron Clark Academy and are making waves in the field of education. They also have a book out called The Wild Card. I encourage all teachers to read this book. They give simple, practical tips, of how to make the magic happen in the classroom. After this session I attended several break out sessions to dive deeper into content, all of which were amazing!!! Day 2 breakouts for me were: Math Super Solvers, Marvelous Writers, and Social Studies and Culture. In each of these sessions I was able to listen to very knowledgable teachers, some that I knew and some that I didnt (but I now follow on social media). In the afternoon we also got to hear from two very talented current and former Ron Clark Academy students. These two students were both incredibly well spoken and brave to speak and inspire a room of 4,200 teachers. They shared about their lifetime impacts from their teachers.
Here are some pictures from day 2:
"Teacher crushing" getting to meet Amy Lemons
Just a portion of the amazing "swag" given to us
Getting to listen to the amazing Hope King
Day 3:
Day 3 was another incredible day at GYTO. We started out in the morning by getting to listen to five different teachers' stories and why they became teachers. Each of these stories were very touching and motivating to keep building relationships with our students because thats what truly matters. After this keynote we broke out into some more amazing breakout sessions for the day. My sessions for day 3 were: Building a Super Classroom Community, Building Super Readers, and The Art of Integration. The afternoon concluded with another session with Hope and Wade King. In this session they talked about how to continue to make the MAGIC happen in the classroom by empowering our students to be successful all the while keeping relationships at the heart.
Here are some pictures from day 3:
"Teacher crushing" getting to meet Chris Pombonyo
Our wonderful host this morning Jared Lemons
Another wonderful session with Hope and Wade King
Being "super reader" detectives
Day 4:
Day 4 was a short, sad, day because it was the day we had to go home. The past four days were incredible full of lots of FUN and learning with like-minded educators. It is my goal to make it to another GYTO National Conference in the years to come. This morning we were able to sit in a Q&A session with some of the GYTO educators. Then we attended one last breakout session before we had to catch our flight: Collaborative Stemagination.
I know it sounds cheesy but I will forever be changed from this amazing conference! Thank you so much to the GYTO staff for an amazing 1st time experience.
For those of you who have never been but are interested in going check out these 3 quick videos of a recap from the week:
And one last thing, if you are looking to get some inspiration from some amazing teachers be sure to check them out on social media:
Hope King
Wade King
Deanna Jump
Lanesha Tabb
Abbie Mullens
Cara Carroll
Cassie Stevens
Amy Lemons
Chris Pombonyo
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