Little Shop of History

I hold ten years of experience in education, serving in both teaching and administrative roles. My teaching experience is predominately in high school and college-level history. I have taught Geography, Humanities, U.S. History, and World History/Western Civilizations, in addition to teaching health for 2 years. I have served on various school committees including Strategic Planning, Digital Curriculum, and Democracy School in addition to mentoring various clubs such as National Honor Society, Young Women Professionals, Ambassador's Club, International Club, and Debate Team.

Students understand history and realize its relevance best when they are provided opportunities to explore, interpret, and question everything. In addition to offering lectures that provide multiple opportunities for student discussion, I utilize primary sources regularly in the classroom, and believe it imperative to teach students about context and how to analyze sources and ask critical questions. Engagement in material is also achieved through the use of simulations and role playing exercises.

Gilder Lehrman History Teacher of the Year nominee, 2020

B.A. in History (2009) - American history focus M.A. in History (2014) - American history focus; Persian studies minor focus - Examined women's groups and their efforts at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition, with a focus on their endeavors contributing to trans-Atlantic cooperation and globalism

My goal as a historian and educator is to create meaningful and purposeful lessons that connect the historical past with modern day issues and allow students to further understand themselves, their communities, and the larger world. I am inspired to provide students will a realistic understanding of history through the works of James Loewen, Arthur Zinn, and the ReVisioning History book series, among others. My background teaching Advanced high school and college level courses has led me to develop no-frills lessons that enlighten my students, teaching them to question everything and discover the answers to their questions through engagement with history. Because of this, I provide an answer key for my lessons when possible, but quite a few of my downloads are answer-key free; the answers to many of the questions I pose to my students are opinion-based, and the conversations the instructor hopes to inspire are dependent on grade level, skill level, and the general material already covered in the course. I hope you enjoy searching through my resources. You will find tons of primary source/document analyses and lessons on incorporating short stories into the history classroom. I have presented at conferences on conducting simulations and role-playing exercises in the history classroom, and offer a few of those as well. Your students are sure to love simulating Rome's fall or seeing all their hard-earned money disappear in the stock market crash of 1929!