While I create my lessons around state standards, I always think to myself when forming a lesson, "will the kids enjoy this?" While I'm not naive and realize that learning can't be fun ALL the time, I do aim to create a learning atmosphere that is engaging and interesting for the students to learn by using multiple teaching strategies to reach and teach each learner. I do this with a lot of games to reinforce concepts, humor in the SMART board lessons I create and post-it notes next to my bed when I have a brainstorm at 3am. My students are middle schoolers, so they are more than happy to provide constant and immediate feedback for both lessons they've enjoyed and those that need to go in the archives of lessons which bombed. I love what I do and try to transfer that energy to my teaching because if I don't enjoy doing what I do, they kids won't enjoy learning what I teach!