Math Maker

Currently, I am working as a Math Curriculum and Instruction Specialist in Texas. I taught middle school math for 12 years, and have been developing my own curriculum for the past 6 years. I began my teaching career when I joined Teach For America in 2006, and was placed at a middle school in Liberty City Miami. While I taught in beautiful Miami for 3 years, I began leading professional development sessions centered around teaching middle grades math. In 2009, I moved to Chicago to teach at a small charter school on the Southside of the city. During my two years in Chicago, I worked under an amazing leadership team, and was able to really hone my craft of teaching. I began placing a strong emphasis on teaching my students to develop a deep conceptual understanding of the content, and in turn saw my student's achievement sky rocket above many of their more affluent peers. I taught in Atlanta for 7 years now, and have had the opportunity to teach several classes of gifted students each year. This experience has allowed me to develop curriculum that is extremely rigorous and engaging. I take a lot of pride in the curriculum I've created over this time.

It is my philosophy to teach students to understand math through exploration and discovery. Once students have a basic understanding of a concept, it is my job to lead them to make connections and develop an understanding of the reasons behind the concepts.

Undergraduate: University of Missouri-Columbia Masters in Curriculum and Instruction: University of Kansas

After attending a math and science conference in Houston in 2008, my philosophy of math education has changed. Since that conference, I have learned to teach my students to understand the meaning behind the mathematical concepts they are learning. I no longer teach easy tricks that can be used to solve mathematical problems, and now lead students to see the hows and whys of each concept.