With 30 plus years of educational experience, you might conclude I have wittnessed numerous changes in my profession. Not all change is good nor all change bad. We do need back to basic strengths with reading being a priority in our society and schools.
My Bachelor of Arts in Teaching was secured through Sam Houston State University in 1971. I received a Master of Education with a specialization in Curriculum and Instruction from the University of Texas in 1978.
Teaching experience comes in all sizes, ranging from the college level to junior high and middle school for me. Teaching on the college level for the University of Texas, Tyler was a great experience. Being the instructor for classes in School and Society and Elementary and Secondary Teaching Styles and Strategies certainly prepared me for my role as Supervisor of Student Teachers for certification as well as the high school instructor I am today. With this background in styles and curriculum, my past teaching position, Advanced Placement English Language and Composition and American Literature for the 11th grade, exposed the students to a wide variety of activities and learning experiences. Using this background to reach and assist all the students and faculty of FHS; my next adventure in instructional learning will be as Library Media Specialist of the new Fairfield High School Library facility.
I am the proud mother of one daughter, Ivy Rebecca Phillips, a 2002 graduate of Rice University in Houston, Texas and a 2005 graduate of the University of Houston Law School also located in Houston. When our children are happy our lives seem more stable, and Ivy seems quite please with life as she embarks on a career. I can only thank her for being such a great young lady and for making me so proud of all the accomplishments in her life. She truly is a wonderful person.
Starting a new adventure during middle life gives a whole new meaning to time. Completing the necessary 24 hours of course work and mastering the ExCET merits me an endorsement certification as a Library Resourse Specialist resulting in a career change - Library Media Specialist of the new Fairfield High School Media Center. College classes, workshops, teaching position, parenting, and part-time job creates a new meaning for time off. What ever happened to those lazy Saturdays?
Watching the grass grow - oh, what joy and happiness the outdoors brings. Enjoyment for me comes from being close to nature. The sweet smell from the first blooms of early spring, seeing the Purple Martin scouts arrive, watching the cat run and play, feeding the horse, enjoyment without a price tag. The simple things are the least expensive.
Nadine Ivy Phillips
I updated this site January 7, 2011
"Books Offer Chance for Teaching"
"Books teach kids about characters and characters' lives, although every book is not for every child. Kids read contemporary fiction as much to understand what is going on with their friends as with themselves. The danger is not in reading about these issues, it is in not talking about them. Students who read learn to think. Thinkers learn to see. Those who see often question. And young people who question threaten the 'blind' and the 'nonthinkers.' "
Laura Sessions Stepp, Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 12, 2001; Page C10
Something to think about as a Library Media Specialist:
