International Literacy Association Annual Conference

Boy, have things been hectic and busy!  I feel like I have barely had a real summer, but school is already starting up again!  I did get some time away for just Pete and I, but much of the summer has been spent preparing for my new adventure in preschool.  I also made sure to take advantage of some professional development.  The International Literacy Association annual conference was in St. Louis this year, so I made sure to go.  Besides being lots of fun, I learned a lot!
The opening general session speakers were Shiza Shahid (cofounder of the Malala Fund) and Shaquille O'Neal.  Believe it or not, Shaq has a doctorate in education and has been writing children's books.  These speeches were mostly motivational, but were very good.
Of course, I went to a bunch of sessions.  I got to learn about oral language development in preschool, early literacy and Kindergarten readiness standards, beginning sight word instruction (with lots of freebies!), and a variety of early literacy strategies.  I also got to attend a panel discussion with 5 children's book authors about their books and writing life.  On top of that, I got free food (and alcohol) by listening to publishers talk about their products.  The best one of these was the Scholastic author breakfast, which included Mark Teague, Dan Santat, Brian Selznick, Pam Munoz Ryan, and Jewell Parker Rhodes.  The authors all spoke about their favorite teachers, and everyone got a good breakfast and a nice tote bag filled with books by each author!
Of course, the exhibit hall is always a great place to spend time while at conferences.  I walked away with around $400 worth of free books and materials.  I may very well buy some things from some of the exhibitors in the future because I was so impressed with their products!  However, I got out of the exhibit hall having only spent $3 of my own money.  (That was to buy a copy of Esperanza Rising to get Pam Munoz Ryan to sign.
The closing general session speakers were Stephen Peters and Octavia Spencer.  I had a really good view of the stage for this session.  Once again, the speeches were mostly motivational, but, once again, very good.
I was very glad I went.  I don't think I will be able to make it to Boston next summer because of the other travelling I will be doing, but I hope to make it in the future!
ILA also kicked off their new literacy initiative at the conference.  There are almost 800 million people in the world who do not have basic literacy skills.  If you want to help with their literacy initiative, you can text LITERACY to 91999.  The official hashtag for social media is #800Mil2Nil.