Most teachers I know spend at least part of their summer working on their craft. Whether it is taking summer courses or writing curriculum or journaling or grant writing, most teachers use the summer to step back from the day to day grind of teaching to think about their practice.

And that’s a good thing.

There really are very few professional jobs out there that expect you to be on every day like teaching. Lawyers spend weeks preparing for court, for example. Actors reherse and reherse. Even university professors take semesters off to publish. Teachers are expected to be on every day, and it’s too easy to lose the notion of reflective practice.

But fortunately, there’s summertime.

And the reason I’m writing this is all just to give you a reason to go read what Ms. Frizzle has been writing lately. It’s clear that she’s really using the summer to think and write about our profession… as this post on assessment suggests.