Intentional Teaching and Learning

I retired in June 2019 after teaching middle school Language Arts, History, Creative Writing, Reading Intervention, and Digital Literacy for 32 years in a Title 1 school. Our students are predominantly Latinx, with a large population of Filipinx, students, and smaller populations of Afghan, Sikh, Pacific Islander, Pakistani, Chinese, Vietnamese, African American, and White students. I was also a Literacy Coach for 6 years and a mentor teacher for much of my career. I served on both site and district leadership teams, specifically for English Language Development and Assessment and Literacy. I helped design the curriculum for units in History and Language Arts as well as Digital Literacy. I also ran a Creative Writing after school club for most of my career, as well as a club called Acceptance Club designed to promote inclusivity and create a welcoming environment for all our students, but specifically, for our students who are marginalized based on sexual orientation and gender identity, physical appearance, etc., and their allies. I also led workshops and training on teaching poetry, integrating Creative Writing with History, writing memoirs, reading strategies, and The Invisible Minority: Issues Concerning LGBTQ Youth and Families. I love teaching, especially poetry interpretation and writing and Creative Writing, and I particularly loved integrating Creative Writing with American History. After I retired, I taught Creative Writing to 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders in an after-school program in a Title 1 school one afternoon a week. Currently, I am teaching an after-school Creative Writing class remotely to middle school students and also tutoring middle school and high school students.

I would describe my teaching style as collaborative, creative, and community-oriented. Not only did I collaborate with my colleagues, but also with my students. As the 8th-grade teacher with the most experience, I mentored many of my colleagues over the years. I strived to create an environment in which all my students (and my colleagues) had a voice and a choice. I sought to infuse social and racial justice into my curriculum and always looked for those teachable moments. In History, I focused a lot on the history of those our textbooks don't focus on or don't focus enough on (or as my son once said, it's not only about dead rich white men). I had my students work in groups or with partners both for big projects as well as smaller assignments and focused a lot on process, not just product. I always looked for ways to engage my students by creating engaging lessons that encourage critical thinking and writing, especially creative writing. I loved having my students debate and create. I stressed reading, and in fact, had the largest classroom library I have ever seen. I started collecting books when I was a first-year teacher, and I never stopped. I was proud of my library, and my students actively used it. Although I paid attention to the standards, the standards didn't dictate how I taught. I remember early in my career, my sister-in-law, who was a resource specialist, spoke words of wisdom to me that I passed along. We teach students, not standards. My goal, first and foremost, was to see, hear, and know my students, and then to create lessons and units with that in mind.

2004 Teacher of the Year for my site; 2019 California Teachers Association WHO (We Honor Ours) Award for my contributions to our district around issues of equity for LGBTQ students, 2019 nominee for Holocaust Educator Award.

1974-1978: BA in History with a minor in Spanish from Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ 1978-1979: attended UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA in an MA/PhD program where I studied Latin American and Middle Eastern History 1987-1988: teaching credential from San Francisco State University with a single subject in History credential, a multiple subject credential, and special authorization to teach Language Arts through 9th grade.

I am a married lesbian, and my wife and I have two sons. Our older son graduated from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, CA, in computer science and now lives in Minneapolis and our younger son attends San Diego State University and is a photographer. I love cats and have 2 of them. I love to garden, travel, hike, swim, make art, read, and write. In the past, I have had poems, stories, and essays published in various places. Fun fact: a photo of my wife, my children, their gay father, and I appeared in Newsweek magazine in 2004 during San Francisco's Winter of Love when then-mayor Gavin Newsom decided to let lesbian and gay couples get married-- our 15 minutes of fame!