Five for Friday: 5 TpT Conference Take-Aways

I was totally blessed to attend the TpT Conference in Orlando on Wednesday and Thursday.  It is 48 hours of mind-blowing, never stopping, walk, listen, and take noting, meet peopling, smile and wave moments like no other conference I've ever attended!  To say that it is excitement is to downplay everything about it!  Amazing is a great word to use, but still can't capture it all.  Here are my Five for Friday take-aways with a freebie at the end!

Mindset

I’d have to say this was totally mind-blowing for me.  I know, sounds obvious right!   However, when you enter a world for the first time, things hit you in a different way.  When like-minded people surround you, you adjust your thinking.  I have been spending my whole time on TpT just feeling great about a sale, that it was fun, that it was just extra money.  I have a different mindset now.  It has to be.  There are parts of this that are a business.  I’ve begun to wrap my mind around that.  And, who doesn’t want success in a business=mindset.  I attended a session specifically about this very thing.  It was amazing and finished my first day on Wednesday.  It made me really begin to process as the evening went on.  I’m here to say, set your mind on what you want and how you want it to be.  It is very powerful to meet million dollar teachers and know they are still happy teachers, down to earth, that it doesn’t steal your joy or make you greedy and above others.  SET YOUR MIND!  So, where’s your mindset. 

Money

Again, I had to begin to think about this as real money.  Up until now I pictured it as play money.  Things I could buy for me, things I could do for my family.  I have paid for a mission trip for my son and myself.  But now, this is MONEY!  I attended a financial session (after hearing in the mindset session that if you are at the beginning of your TpT success, make a business plan and have that as your mindset!)  The gentleman that presented was a teacher who just was wise in his finances.  He made himself a millionaire by simply teaching himself what he needed to do!  As a seller, we need to be investing what we are making and really use our profit to build our personal finances.  Time to change my mindset!

Networking 

Wow!  There are SO many people at the conference-and many know each other at this point.  There were times I really struggled to fit in or find my “tribe”.  I met some wonderful ladies the first night and I did find them from time to time.  I met some of my local ladies and I was glad for that.  I met some of the Florida Bloggers, I’m happy for that.  I attended a wonderful session on Building a Tribe, and that’s where I met a group of ladies that I seemed to bond with.  Both are also from Florida and we seem to work well with each other.  I will be working on building these relationships and building more within the larger group of excellent sellers that I met.  I have to say, it brought to me the importance of finding people to network with and it changed my mindset about how to build and grow my business!

Opportunity! 

There are moments to grab-and you need to!  I was able to speak with one of the TpT Main Players and two things happened! 1.  She took a picture of my store logo to remember me by!  And, 2.  I used what we were talking about to mention a product in my store and SHE WROTE IT DOWN!  Yes, she WROTE IT DOWN!  Now, it may go absolutely nowhere, but I grabbed a moment.  

My moment was with this lovely lady!! :) 

I think the whole event is about grabbing moments, even if they are small.  You don’t have to be in the group of laughing sellers.  You don’t have to stick like glue to pals.  You don’t have to pass out the most business cards.  You have to seize moments.  Some sellers were surprised when they heard all the Teacher Super Stars I just walked up to and started talking too.  I was looking for those moments!  Why not!  I guess I had good mindset on that one! 

If you haven't met Rachel Lynnet, you haven't met the nicest person ever!  She is amazing!

ONE THING

My final take away is that there is one and ONLY ONE thing that guarantees success and repeated sales-QUALITY!   There is no formula-QUALITY! That exact word was used over and over again-from products, to pins, to videos made, to blog posts (Thanks Teeny Tiny Teacher-you were awesome!), to pictures taken that you use.  If it isn’t quality, you will not go anywhere.  You’ll get basic sales, but you won’t get repeat sales.  You want repeat sales.  Unless you commit to the best of the very best of product development, you will just make basic sales.  Quality not quantity matters.  So, I’m making this my COMPLETE mindset.  I’ve always believed that, but there are still a couple of things that I need to really work on in my store to attain what I believe are my current levels of quality!  I’m excited that this is the key, and that it is not some formula that I was missing because I can’t read the forums because they blow my mind.  That I can’t participate in Pinning Parties.  That I can’t get to my blog all the time.  Quality! 

In the middle of the night from Wednesday to Thursday I woke up with the BEST idea-only to completely forget it!  Trust me, going to the Conference makes your brain go on Hyper-active Hyper-drive!  Luckily, at Cracker Barrel during breakfast it came back to me!  A wonderful waitress lent me a pen and one of her order sheets.  I jazzed it up and made it just for this post.  This BEST idea-a basic set of business plan questions that you can fill out to begin to guide your thinking.  These came from a combination of all the sessions and all the ideas sort of jammed into one form!  So, it is yours, for free! We all need to set our minds on how to be the BEST quality we can be!  I’m excited to share it with you!  Down load it here!  

Leave your comments and thoughts about this post!  I’m excited to hear what they are!

Had to randomly share my photo too!

Wacky Wednesday

            Many people would call it Wacky Wednesday, but in our house, we do the Geico commercial.  We now call it the “family” commercial-Julie, Mike, Mike, Mike…Do you know what day it is???  It’s…….The start of my week!  Yes, that’s why it’s Wacky Wednesday.  Let me tell you why I start my week on Wednesday (or even what I mean by starting my week!) 

            Years ago, when Balance Literacy hit the scene, I actually read Guided Readers and Writers by Fountas and Pinnell.  That is the book that got me started on actually reading professional texts.  It is a shame that many of us don’t read professional texts.  There is just too much out there to know now not to read them.  Anyways, off the soapbox.  When I was reading it, I came across the section on scheduling.  In that section, they suggested “starting” your week on a Wednesday.  New spelling words and new word work (notice I didn’t say story).  Remember, this was, and still is, best practice NOT to use a textbook.  Real literature matters and kids need real literature in their hand-not excerpts and especially NOT in intermediate!  I found this idea of a “new” start on Wednesday particularly appealing due to the fact that it had to do with SPELLING.  By starting a new list on Wednesday, you actually give the kids MORE time to learn the words-a true week!  So I tried it out-and loved it!  I’ve been doing this ever since (even when I did use a textbook.  Then I started my story on Wednesday too!).  Through time I discovered something else-the kids and parents liked it BETTER!  It takes a little while for them to adjust, but it does a lot for families.  I know from doing the Thursday night stress studying that this puts a lot of strain on families.  When the majority of review is done on Monday night, families are fresh, minds are not tired, and they really come in prepared.  To me, that says WIN WIN!  Today was the start of our new week!

            What did this look like?  Here’s how it went. 

All my wacky Words Their Way materials!

Last week, I gave the intermediate Words Their Way spelling inventory.  I know that there are a lot of Words Their Way leveled books running around.  For the inventories, you need the original, full text version of the book.  These inventories are great because you can target the specific needs of students by using the inventory page to assess skill level.  Once I got the groups, I then ran the sorts from the leveled books.  The sorts from the leveled books work better because they are organized in a way that makes for easy use.  I then took these and organized them into expand-a-folders.  This will make it easy to pass out each week. 

Eventually I'll add tabs to these.

The kids then received a copy of their sort.  First, they had to write their words in their agenda and have me check them.  This list will still act as a traditional way for kids to practice their words. Parents need this because it stays with tradition.  Teachers need this because it gives extra practice to build skills.  Our grade book needs it so we can keep track of progress through spelling assessments.  Originally, the writers frowned upon this theory.  I was actually glad when the leveled books came out and they had changed their stance.  The weekly homework assignment that I give them is called a Spelling Rubric. I found this YEARS ago online, so I have NO IDEA who even developed it.  Today we spent a good chunk of time just going over the assignments for that.  I assign it on Wednesday and it is due the day of the test, Tuesday.  The one thing I’ve found when using the rubric is that kids love the choice.  I rarely have to “assign” something to kids.  Some vary the rubric, and some do the same thing every week.  There is nothing wrong with either! 

            Once we completed that, the kids cut out their sort and stored it in a ziplock.  This will be saved in their desk each day for use.  Today we couldn’t get to teacher lead sorts.  There just wasn’t time, since this was our first go around.  Tomorrow, I will meet with each team and go through the sort by using the teacher-modeled sort.  I will say the words and show them where the words belong and why.   How I will fit this in, I currently don’t know.  That’s just plain honesty.  I do, however, have an idea.  If it works, I will share it in a post.  So I’m keeping it under wraps for now!  Then, each day, they will repeat their sort in a variety of ways.  On Thursday they will partner sort.  Fridays will be write their sort and explain what the rule or pattern is they are working on.  On Monday they will resort and then glue it to a paper for turning in.  I will probably have them do random sorts at different times of the day as well. 

            One thing to know about sorting and memory:  During our Quantum Learning training, we learned something called 10/24/7.  Sorting is a perfect example of how this theory works. When the teacher sort is finished, they will copy it on their own.  That’s the 10-within 10 minutes of learning something, they should do it again.  The 24 is in hours.  Within 24 hours, they should learn it again.  And the 7-that’s 7 days of time.  Within seven days they should be doing it again for full transfer to long-term memory to work.  That’s what makes sorts key to learning how the sounds and patterns in language work.  It’s hard work doing a program like Words Their Way, but the benefits for kids, both in written language and reading, pay off!  

So, think about Wacky Wednesday for your classroom.  If you have any questions, feel free to ask in the comment section!