I am excited to be in my fourth year teaching here at Decatur, and I wanted to take a moment to introduce myself to those of you who are new to Decatur. I am going into my 23rd year of teaching, having served students and families from all across Chicago in grades 3-8, primarily in the subject areas of Science, Social Studies, and Language Arts. I hold a Master of Arts in Teaching Degree from National-Louis University, and in recent years I was awarded a Golden Apple in Teaching Fellowship and MSUrbanSTEM Fellowship. I have also earned National Board Teacher Certification.

I am extremely passionate about teaching and exploring Science with middle school students! My philosophy of teaching science revolves around guiding students into collaboratively exploring phenomena, both inside and outside of our classroom. Based upon their own observations, under the framework of The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), students devise their own evidence-based hypotheses, test their hypotheses with their own designed experiments and/or engineering creations, and after careful data analysis, they apply their language skills in a variety of ways to communicate their findings to a wider audience. Their audiences sometimes include students from other schools and locations, as well as professional scientists and engineers from local universities or corporate foundations, and even around the world via videoconferencing. 

When I am not in the pursuit of quenching my own lifelong love of learning new things through Science, I love spending time with family and friends. In the picture you can see my family; my wife, Megan, our children Ruby and Hank, and Hank’s service dog, Dosido. I am honored to be your child’s teacher of Science this year and I look forward to working as a partner with you to help your child grow as a learner!