In my classroom, so many lessons started with a story. The best way to capture the interest of my students was with a good piece of literature. Of course, there were times when I couldn’t find the right piece. So, I wrote my own! And other times, I dressed in disguise, and my love for drama saved the day! Queen Priscilla did a very proper lesson on…proper nouns. My hillbilly cousin appeared if the children tricked me into saying the word, ‘kin.’ That lesson on short vowels and rhyming words was almost as much fun as my favorite character, Ms. Ivana Roundbottom, the very eccentric and animated substitute teacher who entertained the class with a lesson on compound words. What a good idea for a book!

Educators often see something cute, funny, or simply memorable. I wish I had written down some of my first and second graders quips that made me laugh. “A Surprise for Mr. Quinn” is one story that made it to a contract with Chicken Soup for the Teacher’s Soul. You can imagine my disappointment when I finally had the book in my hand without my story! It had been axed before production. It is on my list of works to send out again.