First, I read @stoodle’s Exorcising Teacher Demons post.  In his post what stood out to me was that he took the “high road.”  Instead of actually venting for a whole blog post, which could be counter-productive, Matt chose to take his co-worker’s challenge:

If you were asked to come up with 10 things that you’re doing well this year, you could do it.

Then Meg Craig put out the call…

#mtbos, let’s make this a trending blog topic: #10goodthings you’re doing well as a teacher this year. https://t.co/oNBypK4PsC cc: @stoodle

— Meg Craig (@mathymeg07) January 15, 2015

Here is my response to both Matt and Meg, but with a twist.  This year I have learned so much from the twitter/blog community known as #MTBoS (math twitter blogosphere) that I needed to show all of these wonderful educators just how important their impact is for educators across the country.  So, I decided to write 10 good things I’ve learned.

10 good things I’ve learned from the #MTBoS

1. Sometimes questions can be answered with more questions, especially on social media – Even twitter can be a place where you use your “teacher moves.”  I’ve caught Justin Lanier using teacher moves on twitter more than once.  To find out, just ask him a question!

@bkdidact Can you say a little more about what you have in mind?

— Justin Lanier (@j_lanier) January 16, 2015

2. Be critical of everything – Michael Pershan has not only taught me to look more closely at my practice through the investigation of his own, but educators all across the country have learned this as well.

3. Small things can lead to big things – Christopher Danielson proves that even a small conversation with your kids at home or with students at school can lead to big mathematical discoveries.

4. Share and reflect! – Justin Aion shows everyday on his blog that sharing the good, the bad, and the tacos of your classroom can not only be reflective for an individual teacher, but for the education community at large.  Remember though, even the “bad” is really just self-reflective goodness!

5. Math is inherently interdisciplinary – Malke Rosenfeld and Simon Gregg have helped to remind me of my love of poetry and of this Einstein quote, “Pure mathematics is the poetry of logical ideas.”

6. Good classroom routines are good for a reason – Kristin Gray uses great classroom routines in her class everyday and we get the pleasure of experiencing that with her students through reading her blog.

7. Mathematical questions should not be trapped in math class – Keith Devlin, a mathematician, has answered a question or three that I’ve had about math!

8. Ask the big questions and you may just get ALL the answers – Malke, Tracy Johnston Zager, and David Wees are not afraid to pose the big questions regarding math education to the biggest audience there is, twitter.  I always learn so much being involved in their tweet threads!

9. Anything and everything that happens during #elemmathchat – Thanks folks! #ElemMathChat Tweets//

10. How to be a better special educator – You won’t find a more reflective, more caring group of special educators around than #SpEdMath
#SpEdMath Tweets

Also thanks to everyone I missed who has contributed to this being one of the most reflective and exploratory years of my career!//