One Word Can Change The World! What Is Your #OneWord For 2018?

Happy New Year! I hope you had a wonderful holiday season and are ready to kick off an amazing new year with your students, teachers, families and most of all, for yourself.

For today's Shannon's Favorite Finds, I wanted to do something special to kick off the new year.

I thought about creating and sharing my New Year's Resolutions or perhaps creating them focused around libraries, education, reading, technology and our students. 

I picked up the AASL National School Library Standards book I read over the holiday and looked through all of my notes throughout the book as I reflected on my practice as a teacher librarian.

I looked over at the Future Ready Librarian poster hanging on my wall and thought about the personal goals I have written for each one and how these conversations and goals fit into our standards as teacher librarians. 

I looked at a basket that holds a new writing project I just started with a friend and thought about how the ISTE Standards for Teachers....

ISTE Standards for Students are a big part of what we do as educators and librarians too. 

I looked back at my blog and all of the posts and presentations I gave focusing on these topics in 2017.  

Would my New Year's Resolutions be about these things?  Would they focus on the goals I set around these standards and gears?  

I looked back at my Instagram pictures from the last year as I thought some more.

I found the ones from the AASL Conference when I shared and signed my new Library Skills books that I wrote with Cantata Learning and Emily Arrow.  That was a dream come true for me and I know that a current project I am working on will be too!

Maybe I should make some new goals for this year focused on my work as an author? 

Then I came across pictures of our family and started to think about the people I love the most.

I thought about how blessed we are to have the family that we do.

I thought about my parents celebrating their 50th Anniversary on December 17 with all of us and how 2017 was the year my dad, Paul, beat cancer!

I thought about Eric and I's trip last month to see our beautiful daughter Brianna and our son-in-law Jaden who live in Belgium as he serves in the United States Army.  We couldn't be more proud of them.  

I thought about our youngest son Hagan and how proud we are of the young man is becoming.

I can't wait to see where 2018 takes our family.

I also thought about my work as a speaker, consultant and as the Future Ready Librarian and Project Connect Spokesperson.  I am excited to start sharing a big Future Ready Librarian project I am working on within Collections by Destiny, but that will come out next week on January 12.

So, what was it that I was going to share?  What would my resolutions focus on? 

Then it dawned on me.

I went back to a post my daughter wrote on her blog last week.  It was called One Word 365.  She spoke about the same thing I was struggling with today.  Brianna shared how she didn't set any resolutions because she wanted to live in the moment and try something different.

I loved this idea and her one word....Purpose.

What would my one word be? 

I went to Twitter and searched #oneword.  I looked on the One Word 365 site to see what others shared and love....

the list of ideas they shared.

Then I thought....Maybe it isn't just one word I pick today. What about if I brainstormed all of the words that describe me in my profession and the goals I have for all teacher librarians, educators, libraries and school communities?

I opened up wordcloud.com and did just that. This is just a start and I plan to find my #oneword.

So, today for #favoritefindsfriday, I challenge everyone to think of what your #oneword will be.

What will you do this year to make a difference? What will you change? What will your goals be? What do you want for the students you work with and the school community you influence?

What do you want for yourself?

I started this Padlet so we can all share.  You can click here to get to the Padlet and share yours.

Let's kick this year off by sharing our #oneword and encouraging each other to make that word happen.  

We are all part of this amazing tribe and I can't wait to see what we do together in 2018 to make a difference in libraries, education, students lives and the world.  

One word can change the world. 

Happy Friday, friends!