Blog Round-Up for 2017

It's been quite a year, and I think most of us saw it coming. With the election of 2016 in the rear-view,  what could we expect but chaos and trauma, injustice and ignorance? There was plenty of all of that, but there were also doses of hope and many galvanized souls against a common enemy. I blogged about some of that despair and some of that hope. Thanks to all who read along. Here is 2017 in review.

This is my sixteenth post of the year on this blog, plus I posted another four on Throwing Cookies, so 20 posts for the year is four short of my goal, but not too bad.

Many of my blog posts are still about my life as a teacher, and my third most read blog post this year, "Still Learning..." was about a moment when I questioned the work I do. A special group

of students helped me remember why I love what I do. Many of these same students came to our ESA signing day and have come back to visit this winter after their first few months at college (four of them at Oregon!). Watching them come into their own as young adults is another reward of this profession.

My second most-read post came this summer, in the wake of white-supremacist actions. In "Help me, please," I asked for help explaining our world to my kids, my students, and my nieces and nephews.

"On the 75th Anniversary of the Executive Order 9066" I told the story of my father's family as they and so many other West Coast Japanese Americans were interned during World War II. These words and pictures captured a little of the toll this injustice had on the Nakadas.

These three posts have become the fourth, fifth, and sixth most read blogs ever and I appreciate all the reads and shares. And with 2017 behind us, lets hope for more justice and hope in the days to come.