Gabrielle Plastrik
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gplastrik.bsky.social
Gabrielle Plastrik
@gplastrik.bsky.social
2.4K followers 2.3K following 2.3K posts
MG and YA reader, curator of learning experiences, parent, executive function coach, baker, and poet. I work toward a more just world with little choices every day.
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gplastrik.bsky.social
This is one of my favorite passages of Walden. I use it to teach enjambment. Groups of students create poems using mostly only these words. Every group always has a different poem. Then we look at the work the line breaks are doing in their creations. 📖
At length the sun’s rays have attained the right angle, and warm winds blow up mist and rain and melt the snow banks, and the sun dispersing the mist smiles on a checkered landscape of russet and white smoking with incense, through which the traveller picks his way from islet to islet, cheered by the music of a thousand tinkling rills and rivulets whose veins are filled with the blood of winter which they are bearing off.
November 9, 2025 at 6:52 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
A Civil War cannon in Grant Park in Galena, IL. It took a cannon to its side (you can see the dent)!

#iteachsocialstudies
July 4, 2025 at 4:02 AM
gplastrik.bsky.social
If you are teaching students to grow as writers attending to sentence construction puts a lot of tools in their tool box. Check our Mr. Luther's resource and chip in! #iteachenglish

Lev Grossman's The Bright Sword is full of interesting syntactical arrangements.

Here is one from page 814:
Text from the novel. Page 814.
June 23, 2025 at 4:03 AM
gplastrik.bsky.social
Puppy at the beach!
Take care!
May 15, 2025 at 4:42 AM
gplastrik.bsky.social
Thanks again for the fact checking!
April 28, 2025 at 5:17 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions is laugh out loud funny & deeply serious.

Check out this section where she is talking herself into the idea that it will be okay that her unborn baby will someday have to start 7th & 8th grade, which she calls "the hell and the pit."
🍎
Text from Operating Instructions.
April 16, 2025 at 12:54 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
🍎 📖 🗺
ELA, Humanities, & history teachers can help Ss to observe and learn from their emotions by noticing when characters in lit. and people in hist. are & aren't doing that. We can process "What would you do differently" & "What did they do well in terms of emotional awareness" in discussion.
Thr cover of Shift. It is mostly a white cover. The title of the book is black and takes up the top half of the cover. The authors name, "Ethan Kross," is at the bottom, also in black. In the middle, there is one of those things with thr metal magnet balls where you hit one and it hits all of them. They are emotions in colors from red to green. The green "happy" one is the one being pulled back.
March 1, 2025 at 1:42 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
This looks amazing!

I just started Rising from the Ashes. So far, it is definitely worth picking up.

paulayoo.com/books/rising...
White box around the cover of Rising from the Ashes, which depicts LA on fire in 1992.
February 25, 2025 at 5:46 AM
gplastrik.bsky.social
If you have time to pop in for a session (or join us for the whole day!), sign up for @edmindfully.bsky.social Educating Mindfully's free virtual resource showcase THIS FRIDAY!!! 🍎 🗺 📔

Check in with yourself, self-regulate, and learn useful tools & strategies!

www.educatingmindfully.org/showcase
White box with an orange border. Blue gear shape with "Educating Mindfully" inside it in the upper left corner. Text reads: Resource Showcase. Mindfulness, SEL, Wellness. Friday, February 21st. Free, Virtual, open to all. Vendors appear below. Click the link for the full list.
February 19, 2025 at 8:22 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
If your school is interested in ways to support students with SEL and wellness, check out this free resource showcase from Educating Mindfully. #educatingmindfully #SEL #wellnessinschools 🍎

RSVP Here: www.educatingmindfully.org/showcase
White square with orange border and some blue and black text. Educating Mindfully logo in the upper right corner. Text: "Resource Showcase: Mindfulness, SEL, Wellness. Free Virtual Event, Friday, February 21st, Open to All. If you are looking for new resources for mindfulness, SEL, and wellness within your classroom of school, we invite you to our Resource Showcase! Learn more at educatingmindfully.org."
February 13, 2025 at 8:41 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
Counting in Dog Years is a great mix of poetry and math
📚👍.
This is thr cover of counting in dog years. There are zany things all over a dark blue background with a yellow border. A dog with balloons and a birthday hat is at the bottom.
February 9, 2025 at 1:17 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
📚👍 City Spies: London Calling does not disappoint!

We drew out the last chapter because we didn't want it to end.

Now, the wait begins again!
Three kids run across a bridge in front of Big Ben. The cover of this books glows a warm yellow. The title is blueish green and positioned over the Thames, which flows under the bridge the kids are on.
February 9, 2025 at 1:15 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
📚👍
If you are looking for a way to use a holiday gift card for a kid, consider checking out thr Cybils short lists.

It is such a great experience to judge Elem/MG realistic fiction to help male these short lists. These are excellent books!
Not Nothing book cover The Misfits book cover The Tenth Mistake of Hank book cover Hooperman book cover Tig book cover Bletchley Riddle book cover The Door Is Open book cover Grow Up, Luchy Zapata book cover
January 3, 2025 at 2:08 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
This poem was with me a lot during the last T. presidency, and silence continues to be on my mind a lot now.
"On the Fifth Day" by Jane Hirschfield with a picture of a river above it.
December 28, 2024 at 3:19 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
The Learning Network had a calendar of their NYT contests!

Some students benefit from a winter break challenge and might be interested in getting ahead on a contest.

📖 🗺
This is a screenshot of the NYT writing contest calendar, which can be found on their Website. The logo for the Learning Network is on the bottom right. There is a Clipart of someone at a desk on the top left and a Clipart of someone lying down and reading on the top eight. The background is white.
December 12, 2024 at 1:58 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
And whole class feedback for final essays and projects is THE WAY.
December 3, 2024 at 8:31 AM
gplastrik.bsky.social
If you are looking for ways to invite students to level up their thinking, the dimensions of depth and complexity provide a tool box. These are great ways to differentiate without adding more work for students who are ready to do more.
🍎 🗺 📖 🕰
A 4x4 grid with the image the goes with each type of thinking. Tope left box says "Dimensions of depth and complexity." Then, the next two are Language of thr Discipline and Details. The second row is Patterns, Rules, and Trends. The third row is Unanswered Questions, Ethics, and Big Ideas. The final row is Over Time, Multiple Perspectives, and Across Disciplines.
November 26, 2024 at 12:26 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
🗺 The UN held Summit of the Future Action Days in Sept. The youth who gathered crafted a doc with their recs for youth involvement in progress on key issues. I can imagine some neat ways to use this doc in small groups or as a text for interpretive discussion.
The full doc: lnkdln.in/eEj4RpTJ
This is the cover page of the document. It is white with a dark blue triangle across the top. On the bottom right, it says the name of the document: "Summit of the Future Action Days." In an orange box under that, it says "Outcomes: #YouthLead for the Future." Then, the date appears in lighter blue: "20 September 2024." The UN logo and Summit of the Future logo are little in the bottom right corner.
November 25, 2024 at 2:07 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
I really appreciate the "what do busy teachers actually need to know angle." Sometimes researchers and people peripheral to education forget how much is actually happening every minute of a teacher's day.
And if the kids are in distress, how far away research and theory feels...
Picture of text from linked article starting at "In terms of the educational conversation" and ending at "knowledge of the curve." Black text double spaced on a white background.
November 22, 2024 at 12:30 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
Layla also says hi from WA. This is her new "fun" thing to do.
White dog with tan spots standing alert on white stone patio tablenin fenced yard
November 22, 2024 at 5:13 AM
gplastrik.bsky.social
I am so excited for the Glow conference. Education can help people learn to take care of each other, and this summit is such a powerful reminder that a lot of us are doing this work all over the globe.
🍎 🗺 📖
A black background with a vibrantly multicolored circle on the right. It says "GLOW' in all caps in neon colors insider the circle. On the left in none blue, it says, "An Education Conference with Real World Impact." There is a link to ring central, the digital platform hosting the conference. The conference is 11/20 and 11/21 in 2024.
November 20, 2024 at 11:26 AM
gplastrik.bsky.social
"Gifted children are like finely tuned instruments; they pick up the faintest nuances in their environment, making the normal ups and downs of childhood feel overwhelming." 🍎

Not knowing that is dangerous.

search.app?link=https%3...
White background. Magenta and purple rectangles arranged as a table with examples of gifted anxiety listed. At the bottom, a confused brain and question marks and a therapist and a patient on a couch.
November 19, 2024 at 8:07 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
🍎 If a child you work with meets the majority of these characteristics (Silverman) --regardless of accomplishments-- consider your work with them through a lens of giftedness.
Linda Silverman's giftedness parent checklist. You can find it as a pdf here: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5ec9e1a3d3815c7ebcd0503a/t/5f20ea110dc2ae486277f0c3/1595992594686/Characteristics%2Bof%2BGiftedness%2BScale%2B2014.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiE3r36lOmJAxUZGjQIHWNNNkMQFnoECDYQAQ&usg=AOvVaw3N7moMz8P5l4WsAFDpH4j7
November 19, 2024 at 7:53 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
2/4 In The Coast of Utopia, Tom Stoppard says this quote about children. It isn't the point of the full speech. Our folly is: adults try to create happiness for future generstions w/out creating happiness for ourselves in the present. How do you create joy for you & your Ss in the present?
Because children grow up, we think there purpose is to grow up. But a child's purpose is to be a child." -Tom Stoppard Quote is in white typenwriternfont over a picture of children looking out of a window to a forest.
November 18, 2024 at 1:43 PM
gplastrik.bsky.social
A historian posted a blog about A More Just Future by psychologist Debbie Chugh. This book deals with the paychology of unlearning history-important for this political moment.
Perhaps it can help Ts in places unfriendly to a wider lens on US history.
Or all of us. 🗺
www.google.com/amp/s/nextbi...
Black text on white background: “The key is to stop looking for the missing puzzle piece and accept that the puzzle is unsolvable.” "Wendy Smith, Marianne Lewis, and other paradox scholars have done research that shows that embracing a paradox mindset opens up tremendous possibilities for us. It makes us more resilient. It makes us more creative. The key is to stop looking for the missing puzzle piece and accept that the puzzle is unsolvable.:
November 18, 2024 at 1:18 PM