“Learning is mostly about talking; teaching is mostly about listening.”

These words capture the essence of my work in schools to foster student learning. That is, my philosophy of education is grounded not so much in how to teach but rather in how children learn. My undergraduate experience as a child development major at Tufts University provided me with a lens for observing children and using these observations to inform my decisions as a teacher. I brought this understanding with me to my years as a first-grade teacher in Wilton, Connecticut, and it was by listening to first-graders’ mathematical thinking that I became passionate about the development of children’s mathematical ideas.

I pursued a Master's Degree from the Bank Street College of Education Leadership in Mathematics Education program. From my graduate experiences, I developed a deep understanding of elementary mathematics curriculum, pedagogy, and theories of adult development and change. I then moved onto experiences as a mathematics staff developer/coach and coordinator in elementary mathematics (K-8 and K-5) over the past nine years. I have served for the past eight years as a K-5 mathematics specialist/coach and curriculum coordinator in the New Canaan Public Schools, an affluent suburban town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, approximately 50 miles from New York City.

Job-embedded professional development in the form of coaching has been the primary vehicle for moving curriculum and instruction forward in New Canaan. I have immersed myself in this professional development work over the past nine years, including my role as facilitator of online coaching seminars. I am the author of a professional text, Moments in Mathematics Coaching, published in March, 2010 by Corwin Press, that describes principles and skills of mathematics coaching. In addition to coaching, my work in New Canaan has most recently focused on the development of Response to Intervention models in mathematics, not only to support struggling students but also to promote the continued growth of high-performing students in a differentiated classroom.

Finally, I completed a sixth-year Educational Leadership / Administration degree program at the University of Connecticut in the spring of 2009. This program allowed me to examine how coaching may be integrated into the work of administrators to ensure the growth of teachers in schools, and it also included coursework specific to educational policy. This heightened my awareness of the need as an educator to have a voice in matters of policy and to harness policy as a leverage point for school improvement. This ultimately led me to apply for the Teacher Ambassador Fellowship with an interest in continuing to study policy topics and their application in schools and with a desire to contribute to the policy conversations as an educator.

My Fellowship work during the 2009-2010 school year included policy research in the area of teacher evaluation systems that link to professional growth. I will use this research experience in the next year as I lead the New Canaan Public Schools in the study and redesign of its teacher evaluation and growth system. My hope is that this project will bring together my passion for teaching and student learning, my commitment to coaching and teachers’ professional growth, and the new insights into policy initiatives that I have gained through the Fellowship in order to make lasting impact in New Canaan and beyond.