Here is a snippet of an email I received yesterday through the English Teachers companion Ning. I have been a member of this ning for approximately two years and find it invaluable; I have connected with others and shared resources.

I was so excited as the person detailed that she was in Minnesota and her school was “next to the Mille Lacs band of Ojibwe reservation so close to half our student population is Native.”  I promptly replied and hoped to receive an email.

Here is Karla’s morning reply:

I’m so very happy you wrote back…I was absolutely giddy at home last night when I first saw this.  🙂

I will be looking at your sites later today, and in the meantime, I’m going to forward your email address to my tech and admin to see if they can at least add you, for now, to see our blogs on our school’s network.  From there we can build!

Karla also included a photo of her students from last year that went to hear Sherman Alexie speak at a nearby University.  I am so excited to have made this connection with another educator–it is going to be great for all of us!  I shared my student Adam’s blog link with Karla as I mentioned that my class is just starting to blog.  My students’ first post is always a poem modeled on George Ella Lyon’s ‘Where I Am From.’  When Karla received the link she emailed back quickly to say that she does this poem with her seniors and the parents take the student poems to the Spring prom.  I feel as if we are kindrEd spirits.