This is me working hard in Dr. Christie's EMC 545 class!

I have always regarded education as a life long journey. My educational journey has included many formal and informal opportunities to learn. My formal education started when I entered public school as a kindergartner at the ripe old age of five and has continued to this very day...forty-three years after I entered kindergarten. (I know, I am admitting to my age!) After completing public school, I earned a Bachelors Degree in Elementary Education from Framingham State College in Framingham, Massachusetts. Then I took some time off from my formal education and started one of the most important parts of my informal education. I became a wife and mother. My experience raising two children prepared me, in a profound way, to become a caring and understanding teacher. The caring and dedicated teachers that my own children had became role models for me.

I really do not remember a time in my life that I did not want to be a teacher. One of my fondest childhood memories is when my twin sister and I would play 'school' and take turns being the 'teacher' to our younger siblings and our friends. When my son was in the first grade and my daughter started preschool, I finally got the opportunity to start my teaching career. I taught at the preschool my daughter was attending for three years. The name of the preschool that I taught at was called "Stepping Stones" and it certainly was a stepping stone to my career as a teacher. The director that I worked with at the preschool became a teacher at Mirage Elementary in the Deer Valley Unified School District in 1984. A week before school was to start again in 1985, I ran into her at a grocery store and she told me that one of the kindergarten teachers on her campus had just resigned and her principal was frantically looking for someone to replace her. With my friend's encouragement, I applied for the job and got it. I have been employed by Deer Valley Unified School District ever since that fortuitous day. I have had the opportunity to have many wonderful learning experiences as a kindergarten teacher, second grade teacher, reading specialist, counselor and technology specialist. I feel that I have been enriched on a daily basis as a teacher. The students that I have worked with have taught me so many valuable lessons, especially, to be patient, understanding, tolerant, curious and willing to a risk.

My formal education has continued all during my teaching career. I enjoy taking graduate and district classes that help improve my teaching skills. I just recently completed a Masters Degree in Counseling through Northern Arizona University. I have had the opportunity to do support groups and individual counseling on my campus and the program I just completed was a great help in becoming a better counselor. The newest chapter in my formal education has just started at Arizona State University-West. I am enrolled in the Masters Degree in Educational Media and Computers program. Five years ago I was probably the most computer phobic teacher on my campus but with the help of my students I was reluctantly pulled into the Technology Age. Last year I 'took a risk' and became the Technology Specialist on my campus. A day does not go by that I do not learn something new in the wonderful world of technology! What I use to fear has become a passion for me. So as you can see my journey as a life-long learner continues and what a fulfilling and exciting journey it has been!