Elizabeth+Kenyon



I am a second year doctoral student with interests in teacher education, critical studies and social studies education. While not reading, writing, teaching or grading I love to run, crochet, bake and read for fun. My teaching experience includes three years in Washington DC working with special education students and one year in Vermont as well as years working with youth in Argentina, New Bedford, MA and Washington DC. I am currently focusing my studies on teacher preparation and democratic teaching methods. I grew up in Adrian, MI, attended Albion College for my BA in History as well as the School for International Training for a multicultural service degree and then Keene State College for my MEd. I am also gluten free (not by choice) and am happy to exchange GF recipes or good places to eat.

Reflection 1: Favorite Social Studies class memory. Unfortunately I did not have any phenomenal social studies teachers. I did enjoy Mr. Schwartz who had us develop a mock government in the class, it seems I was elected president for a while. He also took special interest in students, especially the dorkier ones such as myself. It was nice to know that I had a teacher on my side some days. The other thing would have to be the junior year class trip to Washington DC. Perhaps the best part of the experience for my learning was that another student and I had been selected to write daily articles for our local newspaper so people in town could keep track of what we were doing. Trying to synthesize our hectic days and make sense of it every night was hugely helpful and it had a purpose (or at least we thought it did).

Worst Social Studies class memory: Unfortunately there are so many it is hard to pick one out. I remember a long string of years of reading textbooks and answering questions and then taking tests. I also had a teacher who would put on River Dance whenever there was a sub or he couldn't think of anything else to do. We also watched Shogun in that class, a very very very long movie that I am sure he used simply because it took up so much time. Interestingly enough, despite all the bad teaching I did like the teachers themselves. Mr. Sutherland wore a different tie every day in the 6th grade and Mr. Smith had been my kindergarten YMCA soccer coach. Why I teach social studies? Well, I wanted to save the world. At first I wanted to be the next Mother Theresa, but I am not Catholic and decided that there are many Mother Theresa's out there but only one famous one, and since there was no guarantee of being famous I needed to find another path. I bounced around the world a bit, thinking that I could still find something big and flashy to do. I resisted the classroom, it felt too small, I wanted to impact a lot of people, make big changes. But slowly my focus shifted, I let go of the dream of being some sort of a super hero, at least the sort of super hero I had always imagined. I remembered how as a 5 year old I would line up my dolls in front of a little chalkboard my parents had hung on the wall of our "Michigan Basement" so I could teach them. I started thinking about history, citizenship, sociology, economics, government, etc and how they are taught and how things could maybe be better. I got some very sage advice from a favorite professor of mine who told me that there is a lot of work out there in making the world a better place, you have to find the thing that gives you energy and do that. As I discovered, teaching both gives and takes energy, it is the hardest and best job I have ever had. Yes, I do it for the kids and I do it for the content, but the real magic lies somewhere else, where the students, myself, the knowledge, the excitement all come together and change everyone and everything involved. So why did I leave K-12 teaching to get a PhD? That conversation will have to wait for another day.