"I have been a school teacher all my life. Teaching and learning is central to me. I founded Discovery Charter School, a small family and community-oriented public middle school in downtown Newark, New Jersey. I have a doctorate in education from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. I have state teaching certifications in English and Social Studies, as well as Special Education. Recently I started tutoring online during the pandemic and love it! The best part of teaching for me has always been the relationships built around learning - the dynamic partnerships that develop as teachers and students learn new material together.

I teach writing by encouraging students to do all kinds of writing on topics in which they have a personal interest, using many different formats. This year, my students have produced short stories, essays, poems, photo essays, letters, dialogue scripts, lesson summations, and responses to literature. I teach grammar within the context of student writing, and I help my students develop a bank of vocabulary words to use as personal writing tools. I believe reading goes hand-in-hand with writing. My students and I together read a diverse array of printed material: books, newspapers, short stories, poems, and others." less...