LEGO® Math: Kindergarten

Hello! I am looking forward to meeting your student on Outschool! I am a certified teacher with 20 years of experience educating children in the classroom, online, and through home-schooling. The majority of my life has been spent leading, preparing, and equipping youth in many capacities. I have a Bachelor of Science degree in Elementary Education (grades K-6) from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and a Master of Arts degree in Counseling. In addition to the lower grades, I have also taught GED preparation classes to high school students and online foreign language classes. In the past three years, I have completed 4,500 online classes as a TEFL/TESOL instructor and independent contractor. My training in education has been extensive, and I have gratefully received several awards, including a nomination for Teacher of the Year.

I have four children (ages 13, 11, 7 & 4), one of whom I have home-schooled. At our local elementary school, I lead an afternoon enrichment club open to all grade levels (2019-2020 enrollment of approximately 70 students). I have served as a volunteer for several churches over the past 25 years, all in the areas of youth and children's ministry. I have spent many years teaching curriculum, instruction, and lessons that I have created and developed myself. Keeping children engaged in the lesson and encouraging them to be life-long learners is very important. I have an upbeat personality and I love making classes fun and interesting!

When I am not formally teaching, there are several hobbies that I enjoy. Since I was young, I have had a great interest in all forms of art. During high school, I worked as an internist for the Winston-Salem Arts Council in North Carolina. We were commissioned and paid to produce artwork for clients in the community. I have studied and created art involving the following forms/media: portraiture, landscapes, charcoal, watercolors, pastels, calligraphy, jewelry-making, beadwork, wire-wrapping, polyclay, sewing, woodworking, sculpture.

As a student, I always enjoyed hands-on learning assignments with manipulatives. As a teacher, I try to incorporate more than one subject area into a lesson to accelerate the students' learning. As a parent, I feel that core standards and grade level expectations are often difficult to interpret. In my Outschool classes, I desire to incorporate as much grade level content into a lesson as I can, ensuring parents that their students are gaining knowledge that will support them in the traditional classroom. In addition, I love to use props, visuals, and manipulatives while teaching to keep students engaged in the lesson. I am excited to see your student in the classroom soon!