I have just moved back to my full-time home in Tucson, Arizona. Although the unpacked moving boxes are annoying, rearranging my life has had its benefits. One of them is reassessing the books on my shelves and pondering the limited space I now have for hard copy books.

In my bookshelf explorations, I came across a photo album that included some of my fondest moments as a practicing school librarian. One of them was taken at Gale Elementary School in Tucson (circa 1998) when I offered a “thundercake” beginning of the year social event for classroom teachers and specialists.

In Arizona, the new school year begins toward the end of the summer monsoon rain season. The connection to Patricia Polacco’s book gave me the opportunity to share the story and my hopes for the “ingredients” that would make our school program a success that year. During the social time, I encouraged my colleagues to share their hopes and dreams for the upcoming year.

Of course, I displayed new books and resources, but most importantly I reached out to build relationships with my colleagues. Thanks to Patricia Polacco’s book and “thundercake” recipe, I offered a tasty invitation to increasing collegiality as a foundation for future classroom-library coplanning and coteaching in the new school year.

The first few weeks of a new academic year are an ideal time to focus on building relationships. If you haven’t yet invited your colleagues into your school library for a social time, consider baking a “thundercake” and talking with them about how you can work together to create exciting and effective learning experiences for and with preK-12 students this year.

Image Credit

Polacco, Patricia. Thundercake. New York: Philomel, 1990. Print.

Note: Welcome back to the Building a Culture of Collaboration® (BACC) Blog. Over the summer months, changes in the co-bloggers life commitments have resulted in the blog becoming, at least for the time being, a solo activity for me, Judi Moreillon. I will miss reading the ideas, thoughts, and questions posed by my BACC colleagues.