AmandaFoxFlipped's video: Amanda Fox Meet the Teacher HolyTrinity

Hi. I’m Amanda Fox and I will be teaching 7th grade English Language Arts and Literature at Holy Trinity this year. Even though it’s starting off as a stranger year, I’m so excited for the epic journey we have ahead! Before we take a look at what the year will look like in terms of curriculum and technology, I want to tell you a little bit about me! First off, I love film, memes, pop culture and coffee more than 11 loves waffles. But more than anything else—I love a good pun. Over the course of the last decade I have taught journalism, film, English language arts and literature, social studies, and digital media. I am originally from the beautiful city of Savannah, Georgia. Prior to moving to Kentucky I taught at the STEM Academy and in 2016 received the STEM Excellence Award, the Emerging Leader award from ISTE, and was acknowledged as a Digital Innovator by PBS. I moved in 2016 and started STEAMPUNKSeDU— a program that focuses on cutting edge curriculum in Science Technology Engineering Artitstic Design, and Math. I am an author of three books, Teachingland, Zom-Be A Design Thinker, and Markertown, due out in Fall of 2020. I’m excited to take my super techie approach and love for writing into the classroom with you guys this year and literally turn it upside down—demogorgons not included. I teach Literature and Language Arts using the STORY Centered Design thinking framework! It merges the Freytag story arc, and the 5 modes of design thinking into one lesson arc that presents curriculum in a story centered manner. My theory is that Jr High students should construct knowledge socially, through collaboration, critical thinking, and creative solutions. I facilitate learning through inquiry and project based learning with choice based activities, that allow for each students’ individual strengths and creativity to shine. I use the flipped classroom model. Which means I can prerecord lectures and play them in class, or have them viewed prior to class which turns class time into meaningful discussions of content, or time for actual project creation. This also allows me to duplicate myself and teach while also floating around the room answering questions. I use a platform called ClassCraft as a vehicle to not only deliver curriculum but also create a classroom culture full of fun random events, teamwork, custom avatars and a gamified approach to learning. The way I design instruction suits face to face time, or NTI if we move to that. There is a parent login as well which will give you access to all of the assignments and curriculum from a student view! We will begin the year with Refugee, by Alan Gratz, and look at Justice and Power through the lens of the stories within and supplemented with poetry of similar themes. Students will be expected to craft their own two voice poems giving a voice to abstract sounds such as fear, justice, power, and peace. In late September early October, we will move onto unit Two, our Thrill of Horror Unit, leveraging the works of Bram Stoker, Edgar Allen Poe, WW Jacobs ,and HP Lovecraft, We will explore fear, the human psyche, and how societal fears often manifest in literature. These will lay the foundations to prepare students for Unit three which will focus more on narrative elements, theme, audience, and dialogue with the expectation that students will write their own children’s book or tale of origin. Printed copies of Books will be available for purchase at the culmination of the unit. Unit four will focus on nonfiction as we turn to investigative journalism, fact checking, and critical thinking. Through podcasting students will tell stories that need to be heard, either in our communities or the world at large. As a grade level we will create a podcast that will be published with the option for pieces to be submitted to the Journalism Education Association for a recognition and competition. In our final unit students will explore dystopian literature and literary analysis through literature circles. They will be prompted to try to create a utopian society, and also identify problems in the local community and pitch service project ideas as solutions to make the world a better place. We will use the United Nations sustainable development goals as a guiding framework to identify problems close to home while relating them back to the world at large. I can’t wait to meet you guys in person! On a scale of 1-10 this year is definitely going to be an 11!