Overview of the 13th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge

This March, we are thrilled to host the 13th Annual Slice of Life Story Challenge. Since 2008, the mission has remained the same: to support teachers who want to write daily.  We believe that teachers who write regularly can better support the students they teach in writing workshops daily.

Across the next few weeks our team of coauthors will provide you with information regarding the Slice of Life Story Challenge (SOLSC), including information about the prizes you could be win for writing and commenting daily. To get you started, here is some basic information for our March writing challenge.

Prize Information

We’ve got a new and improved prize system!

In past years, most of the prizes were awarded at the end of the month-long challenge. This year, we’ve decided to host prize-related challenges twice a week to add a little extra excitement to our community all month long. Don’t worry! We’ll also give away plenty of prizes at the end of the month to those who slice and comment every day throughout the challenge.

In order to be eligible to win a prize, you must meet these requirements:

• You must fill out the SOLSC Participant Data Form, which will go live on Wednesday, February 12th.
• You must submit a link to your “slice” just ONCE daily, no later than 11:59 p.m. EST (New York time), throughout the month of March. (Multiple submissions are not permitted).
• At the end of the challenge, you must sign the Slice of Life Story Challenge Pledge, which will be posted to this blog on April 1st. (You will “sign” the pledge by filling out a Google form, that will certify that you wrote and linked daily by 11:59 p.m. Eastern (NY) Time, and commented on at least three other Slicer’s posts daily.
• Bottom Line: We use the honor system.

Usernames

Please use the same username/email information for all of your March comments. Tips:

• Having a WordPress username makes it easier and faster to post your comments when you visit Two Writing Teachers.
• You don’t have to have a WordPress blog to sign-up for a WordPress username.
• Using a consistent username minimizes the chances of your comment/link to slice going to our spam folder.

Comment Guidelines

We reserve the right to delete comments that fall into the following categories:

• Self Promotion: Please don’t use your comment or link to your blog for self-promotion. The links in the comment section fo our Slice of Life Story Challenge are meant to lead our readers to stories from people’s lives–not just what was on your blog that day.
• Linking and Running: Please do not just drop off the link to your Slice without commenting on at least three other Slice of Life stories. Comments are the foundation of this community. If you choose to link early in the morning, please return later to leave at least three comments.
• Spam: It’s not just big advertisers who spam. Spam can include: Copying and pasting a comment from one post to another, or leaving a message such as, “Nice post. Visit my blog at….” These are forms of spam.

Adults Only in the Individual Challenge

The individual challenge is for educators at any stage of their career. We realize some participants may have a child and/or a student who you’d like to invite to participate in the SOLSC alongside you. If this is the case, we invite your children or individual students to participate in the April Classroom Slice of Life Story Challenge.

• Individuals under the age of 18 who aren’t a part of a classroom community must have an adult sponsor to participate. As the adult sponsor, you must be the person who leaves the link to your child’s/student’s post on their behalf.
• More detail on this policy will be included in the April Classroom Challenge Overview Post. You may also contact the hosts of the Classroom Challenge, Kathleen Neagle Sokolowski and Marina Rodriguez, directly.

Technical Support and Questions

Throughout the challenge, you’ll be assigned to a “concierge” who is a member of our team that can support you with all your SOLSC-related questions. You can find your assigned concierge listed in every SOLSC post, listed alphabetically by participant last names.

Please direct your question to the appropriate coauthor:

• If your last name begins with the letters A-G, please email questions to Lanny Ball at lanny.ball[at]gmail.com.  
• If your last name begins with the letters H-M, please email questions to Kelsey Corter at kelseymcorter[at]gmail.com.
• If your last name begins with the letters N-Q, please email questions to Betsy Hubbard at betsymhubbard[at]gmail.com.
• If your last name begins with the letters R-U, please email questions to Melanie Meehan at meehanmelanie[at]gmail.com. 
• If your last name begins with the letters V-Z, please email questions to Beth Moore, beth[at]elizabethmoore.work.

Did you find a link that is not working? Having trouble with your own permalink? For these and other tech-specific questions, you can email Beth Moore, beth[at]gmail.com.

A Note About Our Website and Spam

On occasion, a Slicer’s comment is marked as spam by WordPress. Recently, our site has been receiving thousands of spam comments each week, making it difficult for our team to monitor when real comments are sent to spam. During the March challenge, if you believe your comment inadvertently went to spam, please contact your assigned concierge. When you contact us, include the approximate time you posted your comment.