#ASCA14 Top 10

Wow. It is hard to sum up the wonderful experience that ASCA 2014 in Orlando was for me! It was my first annual conference experience, and I left with my wheels turning about how I could get to Phoenix next year.  So, I will do my best to give you my "ASCA Top 10" from my experiences on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday (I had to hit the road on Wednesday and wasn't able to do the final half day).  I am going to attempt to include as many practical, hands-on ideas, websites, and resources that I intend to incorporate next year but will inevitably sprinkle them through my blog posts over the next several months as I use them at school.

#ASCA14 Top 10

10.  Being with 2,000+ educators who either work as school counselors, educate school counselors, advocate for school counselors, or want to be school counselors was an inspiring and powerful experience. I got to meet new friends and introduce myself to people like Dr. Wong, ASCA Executive Director (bottom photo).

                                                                *Image from Phil Echols

                                  (L to R) Lauren, Dr. Wong, me, and Mona 

9.  Participating in the state roll call.  North Carolina represents at the ASCA conference every year, and it was so fun to be a part of the hoopla this year. I even got to hold one of the @NCSCA letters!  It's a little blurry, but that's me with the "S."

8. Catching "Tweet" fever.  Twitter was abuzz during the conference with the #asca14 hashtag.  Even if you were #notatasca14, you could get the latest news, photos, and online resources by following #asca14. It is crazy to think that two or three years ago this was NOT HAPPENING at the same level! I LOVED sitting in breakout sessions and tweeting out cool facts from my speakers while also reading about others getting pumped up in their sessions.  The energy and excitement was amazing!  I used Tagboard to follow the entire hashtag in an easy to view way, which can be used for any hashtag (#WorldCup2014 anyone?).

7. Great exhibitors with counselor SWAG.  The number and variety of exhibitors at this conference was overwhelming. As an educator operating on an increasingly tighter budget each year, I absolutely loved meeting the different vendors and getting freebies. Everything from career posters to pens to stress balls to magnets were available. I'm especially excited about a couple of companies that offer professional development and can't wait to see what we might be able to plan for my Professional Learning Community.

6. Girls' Leadership Breakout Session.  I attended Julia Taylor's (@juliavtaylor) Help Girls Unlock Their Leadership Potential session and came away with a ton of great resources.  She has already posted her session Prezi on her website for all to view here so check it out! There were so many powerful videos shared, as well as book titles and activity ideas to use with girls.  In fact, I have already watched the documentary Girl Rising (right) based on her recommendation, which can be rented on Amazon.com.  However, my favorite video to use with my students is this one:

5. Stedman Graham Keynote Address. @OfficialStedman was an amazing speaker, and I especially loved what he had to say about perseverance, relationships, and making choices to be successful. My favorite point (paraphrased) is that we all have the same 24 hours in a day. What are you going to do differently to make things happen? How are you going to create magic? Also, his challenge to use 60 minutes each day reading and learning resonated strongly with me.

So, I am going to start sharing the books I am reading that are making me THINK and LEARN....Thanks Stedman! Currently, it is the book Drive by Daniel Pink, which can be found here or at your local library.  It talks about motivational theory and how the "carrot and stick" approach  may not be the best to use, for companies or our students.





4. Solution-Focused Breakout Session.  This session by Dr. Carol Buchholz Holland from North Dakota State University featured 43 strengths-based activities and techniques to  use with students in individual counseling. I use this counseling theory for the majority of my students due to its brevity and solution-oriented stance and found this session extremely helpful.  It's difficult to sum up 3 hours in a Top 10 post, but I loved Dr. Holland's incorporation of art into her stratgies:  Drawing a picture of something you would like to change when focusing in on the student's goal, "Color Your Life" activity to indicate different emotions the child has, cartooning with superheroes to identify possible solutions, Power Hands activity that identifies the strengths that will help the child reach his goal (one strength written in each finger of the hand outline). She also shared some fantastic videos that could be used with staff or students in a variety of applications. This one was my favorite.

3. My First "Tweet Up". Danielle Schultz, @sch_counselsor, organized this get together for school counselors new to the twittersphere as well as those who wrote their first tweets years ago. I loved meeting new friends and introducing myself to counselors I have admired and respected online for years.  Check out Jan (@humbleofferings) and Kelly (@KellyHanscom) below with a future Miss USA and Jasmine (SeeJascounsel) and Rebecca (@schcslgbyheart from School Counseling by Heart) to the right.  Also, Susan (@SSpellman) gets creativity points for capturing us all with inspiring messages for the world (far right).

2.  My Wifi to Sci-Fi: Motivating and Teaching Students Through Literature and

Technology Presentation.  I must say, I challenged myself to present at the ASCA conference and 45 minutes before I began, I was kind of wishing I hadn't sent in that proposal...Ha! Seriously though, it was one of the highlights of my career thus far to be able to get up in front of my peers at this national conference and share my ideas. Afterwards, I was so happy I had done it and ecstatic about the positive feedback I received (see bottom right picture).  The handout shared through the ASCA conference app can be accessed here. As always, email me if you have specific questions.

1. Michelle Obama's Keynote Address:  I tweeted this about @FLOTUS (First Lady of the United States) during her speech, and I feel even more strongly about it now. Her speech along with this letter to school officials released by Arne Duncan the day before her appearance showed the first lady "gets" how important school counselors are to the students and families we reach each day.

I hope these Top 10 Moments help give you a glimpse of  #ASCA14.  If you didn't make it this year, check out the future dates and locations for this unforgettable event below and put it on your BUCKET LIST.  

Enjoy and Happy Counseling! ~ Angela

Believe. Imagine. Create.

I can't believe that a week from today I will be in Orlando at my first ASCA conference having just finished my breakout session presentation.  I am so psyched in anticipation of the keynote speakers, breakout presenters, receptions, and general overall atmosphere I will encounter as we live the conference theme and plan to "Build Magical Futures."  Even more exciting is the news I got last week that Michelle Obama has been added to the agenda for Tuesday...wow, what a special first conference experience to hear a keynote address from the First Lady! As a school counselor, I especially love her quote to the side because it speaks volumes about priorities and the calling I serve each day with my students.

I truly hope that if any of you are in Florida next week or have friends attending the ASCA conference that you (or they) will stop by during or after my session on Monday afternoon at 3:45 to say hi. I can't wait to meet new colleagues and learn from everyone!

Another last piece of news that I am pumped about is that I FINALLY opened a TPT store for Life on the Fly School Counselor. It was one of my goals for the summer so I'm glad to cross it off my list while it's still June. I will continue to put items on my Life on the Fly Store page, but the majority of my new material will be introduced at my TPT store here.  I hope you will visit me soon!

Happy Counseling! ~ Angela

School's Out for Summer........

AAAHHHHHH.....the first day of summer vacation!  That time when all your summer days are lined up in front of you waiting for adventures, relaxation, fun, and checklists filled with all the things you wanted to do during the school year but didn't have time to do!  It's fun to daydream about all the things you can pack in before the days start whizzing by.  I have a couple of "must do's" that I will share later in the summer, but I wanted to reflect on a couple of fun events from the last days of school.

I was able to get into the fifth grade classrooms following our EOGs to deliver my middle school transition lessons.  You may remember reading about those last year here.  They went really well again, and I added a memory mural activity at one of the centers.  I later posted it during the fifth grade dance so kids could see what their classmates had written. Check it out....

I also wanted to end the year with some positive recognition for our staff who worked SO hard this year amid changes in administration and new district initiatives.  One of our kindergarten teachers had done end of year awards at another school so we used that as a starting point for our first annual Cleveland ES staff awards.  There were eleven categories:  Leadership, MVP, Olympian, Fashion Plate, Mystery, Wild and Wacky, Unforgettable, Jester, Extra Special, Great Ideas, and Star Quality. I created a PowerPoint and made award "props" that will be passed on each year to the next recipient as we continue this tradition.  Luckily, there were lots of ties for first place and honorable mentions were given to all so everyone was included! Here are a few pics of our happy award winners with their certificates and prizes (mine is the Wild and Wacky award with the blue wig :)--go figure!).  

Our last bonding experience of the year was creating our very own "kick off to summer"  video inspired by other teachers' summer videos on YouTube (see our creation below).  It was an awesome way to de-stress and get some fun back after the slammed schedule of EOGs, awards days, graduation, and the end of the year pack-up.  I certainly hope all of you are HAPPY  about summer break and hope to hear from you!                          Enjoy and Happy Counseling! ~ Angela