I spent my teacher summer learning.

As a first year teacher I am already all too familiar with the stigma that comes along with a teacher's summer and the typical comment of "Oh it must be nice to have 3 months off".

There's plenty of post's and articles of teachers arguing that this is not the case, and it's true it's actually only 10 weeks!!!

But really, all jokes aside, the majority of teachers use their summers to catch up on work, organize thoughts and ideas that have been buzzing around in their head or as a time to decompress and come back the next year revitalized and ready to out-do last year, making their classroom experience that much better for their students.

As most teachers do, I took this summer "break" as an opportunity to learn, to grow, as a professional and boy am I happy I did. I'm coming back my second year with a vast amount of knowledge well beyond what I left with and a deeper network of like minded educators working to improve and provide a true #CSforALL education for our students.

This summer I didn't just learn, I grew my passion.

To start, I took a leap and dove into 15-112 Fundamentals of Programming and Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon, adding well beyond what I expected to my own knowledge growth in Computer Science.

Now I can come back to class with a tool I MADE.

A tool I programmed from a blank white page to 1000 + lines of code that my students will use, critique and play test as I continue to improve the tool for their use. I now can truly say that I am using technology to CREATE and I am not just consuming it, the motto of my classroom.

If I hadn't taken advantage of this summer, as an opportunity to learn and grow I wouldn't have made this authentic experience for my students.

I also worked for a local start up, Digital Dream Labs, and helped them with all different educational things, ranging from interviewing other educators for podcasts and tool design feedback to writing curriculum and support content for their upcoming games. Working for this company and helping to support all of the wonderful things they are doing for our youngest learners and classrooms continues to open up doors and opportunities to improve my classroom's experience.

​​Thanks to my collaboration with DDL I had the opportunity to attend CSTA the computer science teacher's association conference.

At CSTA I had the opportunity to learn from other educators and explore in depth with CS teachers from all over the country. We discussed policies and standards that are being designed for computer science education across the states.

I returned from this conference with pockets full of tools and connections to again improve all of the things I am attempting to accomplish in my classroom.

As summer continues I had the opportunity to attend two more workshops. The first was held in my school district. It was called "Studio A" and was created in collaboration with Avonworth Teachers using PBL, LUMA Human Centered Design and local artists, from Pittsburgh's center for the Arts. This workshop was one of the most valuable of the summer. Not only was it another opportunity to hear and learn from other educators but it also was a chance to formulate some of my own ideas with knowledgable support, on hand.

Who else can say their Superintendent sat down and helped them outline one of their PBL units?!

All I can say is AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME! And it's one of the many reasons I am oh so happy and thankful to be working in the school community I am with.

Finally I spent last week in Shippensburg with 100 other "Keystone Technology Innovators" from across the state where I had the opportunity to learn and grow with these teachers. This conference was wonderful for so many reasons, mostly how it brought together a handful of teachers doing awesome things. It gave me the opportunity to meet teachers in similar positions that I would have never otherwise met and is building a network of educators looking to support the future of education.

From this I now have a group of people interested in helping the state create CS standards for all.

Something many of the people I met at CSTA are doing in other states. Now we can help PA move forward in that direction as well.

To wrap up my summer I will be spending about 10 days in Sedona and at the Grand Canyon, enjoying the great outdoors and wrapping up summer with some ( I hope you would agree) much needed R & R.

Next time you talk with a teacher about their summer break instead of starting with "OH it must be nice to have 3 months off!"

I ask you to instead ask how they will be spending their time out of the classroom because I bet the majority will respond with a schedule as full as mine!