Tag Archives: Bridge to Terabithia

10.14.22
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Sierra McNeill Writes a New Chapter for Herself and for TNCS!

Sierra McNeill came to The New Century School fresh from Charlotte, NC to take over the 6th- through 8th-grade homeroom and instruct TNCS students in grades 4–8 in English Language Arts (ELA). She is originally from Fort Bragg, NC, near Fayetteville, and, until now, had lived in North Carolina all her life. Why Baltimore? Ms. McNeill said she was really just looking for “a change of scenery.” Fayetteville had the small-town feel, and Charlotte was an up and coming small city. Baltimore was a good next step up because she wanted to get a little farther north (bit not too far north with colder weather) and because her best friend has lived here for the past 7 years. When Ms McNeill would visit over the years, she developed a fondness for good old Charm City and moved here April 1, 2022! She also appreciates the proximity to Washington, D.C., but feels it’s a little too fast-paced for her.

Even though Baltimore feels “just right,” moving here has still required some adjustments. One of the biggest has been not being as close to her family (see photos), who she is extremely close to. “It was definitely a transition,” she said. “I’m coming from southern roots, and we are all about hospitality—everyone is your neighbor—and it’s not really like that here.” Well, maybe not in Baltimore at large, but TNCS has been a saving grace. “TNCS has been great. I was nervous about coming into this environment as a new teacher, but everyone was very receptive, including the students,” she explained.

Let’s find out more!

Background

Ms. McNeill graduated from Fayetteville State University (FSU) in with a bachelors of arts in English language and literature. She was also a cheerleader there all 4 years—Go Broncos! She had planned to use her degree as a stepping stone: “Teaching wasn’t my first go-to plan. I just knew l going to be a lawyer or a celebrity stylist (I love fashion).

But the way life works is never how you imagine it. So I moved to Charlotte after being administrative assistant in a health care office, and my friends encouraged me to consider teaching there.”

She initially rejected the idea due in part to the enormous responsibility involved in educating children. Quickly realizing that having that very understanding is exactly what we need in teachers, she went for it. “I interviewed and jumped in mid year in a 3rd-grade classroom after their teacher left.” She didn’t feel grade 3 was quite right for her and sought a classroom with older children. She accepted a position as 5th-grade teacher at another school, where she taught for 2 years. And then it happened: she began teaching ELA and reading to 6th-graders, “and the rest is history,” as she puts it. Middle school is her jam! In fact, she taught 7th- and 8th-grade briefly at a Baltimore public school when she first arrived here. “It didn’t quite feel like home,” she explains, “coming from the school in Charlotte, which was very close knit, very family oriented. This school didn’t give me that community aspect. So I started looking again and came across TNCS. I spoke with Ms. Johnson and the previous interim head of school, and I felt really good from the jump.”

Sierra McNeil at TNCS

At Orientation Day for the 2022–2023 school year in late August, it was clear that Ms. McNeill was excited for what was coming. Her enthusiasm for teaching–and teaching ELA—is obvious.

I feel like every teacher has their unique ‘teacher swag’ in the way they approach things. I’m very calm spirited, although I am also energetic and bubbly. Being a younger teacher, I try to be ‘chill’ so I can connect with the kids in what’s happening in their society and their day-to-day. I’m a music and sports person, so I can connect with them on that level, too.

Reading

“I try to make everything relatable and to emphasize that real-life perspective in all subjects but especially in what we’re reading,” explained Ms. McNeill. “I try to make sure they can find things they enjoy reading. So, I take what is necessary for them to learn in the curriculum and somehow tie it into reality so it’s full circle to make it really click for them.”

In Quarter 1, grades 4–6 read Bridge to Terabithia, by Katherine Paterson, and 7th- and 8th-graders read Lois Lowry’s The Giver. Age-appropriate themes galore in those two novels!

Next up is an 8th-grade “novel study” focusing on Rita Williams-Garcia’s One Crazy Summer and breaking out into small-group discussions about this gem of a book. Also, new this school year, in 8th-grade seminar, 8th-graders will be reading William Golding’s Lord of the Flies and discussing that must-read with Head of School Erika Johnson in depth. This seminar, by the way, will also include high-school prep, what’s expected of them as leaders of the school, and other topics specific to this age group. “It’s nice that they get their own personal time, despite the class being mixed ages, to really hone in on what they need to accomplish before the end of the school year.” said Ms. McNeill. “I think it’s very cool that Ms. Johnson recognized this need and made it happen. I think it’s going to be beneficial this year and hopefully for years to come.”

Writing

Her fondness for teaching reading notwithstanding, Ms. McNeill’s true passion is teaching writing. “I like seeing kids gain confidence once they figure out the formula—how writing is just taking your thoughts and laying them out.” Her students actually just started this writing unit this week, and Ms. McNeill has done all she could to get them excited for it. She is a sworn journal-er, sometimes writing from a script—the goals for the day and which of those were achieved—sometimes just cataloguing her day. “I try to instill that in the students, too. We do ‘Daily Writes,” where I give them a prompt. But I other than asking that they write in complete sentences, we keep it informal.” She explains that these exercises help get her students into the habit of writing paragraphs, so that when it comes time to write actual essays, they are prepared. She also strives to engage them by giving these prompts as hooks that will reel them in, which is great practice for getting them to think through their topics and how they will write about them.

“It’s Very Different—A Good Different!”

Now that Ms McNeill has been at TNCS for a couple of months, she is finding her groove. Mixed-age classrooms are both new and not so new to her. Although she had never taught in one until now, she did attend Montessori school (Cumberland Road Elementary) for a couple of her elementary years. “Although it’s different, it’s a good different,” she said. “It exposes ids to different different aspects, different maturity levels. It has been challenging, but once I sat with Ms. Johnson and talked about expectations, it kind of just started to flow. I had already taught  with differentiation—teaching different ways to different learning styles and diversifying lessons for different learning abilities. So I was able to tie my experience in here at TNCS.”

Despite two huge life changes, relocating to a new city plus accepting a position new to her in many ways, Ms. McNeill is certainly finding her way. She is a vegetarian and a foodie and appreciates the many restaurant options Baltimore offers. She enjoys strolling around downtown, the Inner Harbor, Fell’s Point, and along Howard Row‘s Black-owned businesses in particular. She likes reading and going to the movies. What she would really enjoy, though, is getting to know the TNCS community better. “I’m very family-oriented,” she said emphatically, “if there’s any family-inspired event going on, invite me. I’m looking for different things to engage in in the community, so if your kids play sports outside of school, I’ll show up and support!” She is also very excited for upcoming school events like Hispanic Heritage Nights and the Winter Concert—she can’t wait to join the festivities and immerse herself in and be welcomed by the TNCS community!

01.08.16
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Meet the Teacher: Kiley Stasch Joins TNCS Elementary!

As the elementary program at The New Century School expands to accommodate its growing elementary student body, so too grows the elementary staff who guide and help educate them. For the 2015–2016 school year, TNCS welcomed Montgomery County native turned Baltimore resident Kiley Stasch as the new Language Arts and Global Studies teacher.

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Elementary Language Arts and Global Studies teacher Kiley Stasch in her TNCS homeroom.

“I’ve taught a broad range of areas in both public and private education,” said Ms. Stasch, all of which was part of her search to find the right fit. She graduated from Goucher College in 2012 with an Education major and a minor in Spanish. Since that time and before joining TNCS, she did lots of substitute teaching across Baltimore, such as at Roland Park Elementary and The Friends School to get the feel of both types of schools. Before deciding where she ultimately wanted to lead her own classroom, however, she went back for a Master’s Degree in teaching at-risk and diverse learners at Goucher. Then, being fluent in Spanish, she taught English in Peru over the past summer. “So being at a school like this is really exciting, to be able to find that bilingual connection and be in an environment that supports my speaking Spanish in the classroom,” she said. That sealed the deal for her.

Her bilingualism has not only been fun for her to use among classrooms full of students who share her ability to speak both English and Spanish, it has also allowed her to guide a (now formerly) non-English-speaking student who joined TNCS this academic year through the process of acclimating to unfamiliar surrounding amidst a new cohort of peers.

She spent the first weeks of school meeting in small groups to see where each student was in terms of reading and writing status so that she could differentiate instruction both among class levels and within each 2nd- through 5th-grade class itself. “Because we are able to do four separate small groups,” she said, “each student can be placed exactly where they should be and then challenged appropriately at that level.”

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The Daily 5.

As her main classroom focus is reading and writing, her students do the Daily 5, as they did  in previous years with Mrs. Duprau, but they reduce it to four daily rotations. “I decided to give the students a little more time with each of four components every day rather than squeezing in all five in the same day, so each day they get a break from one of the components and don’t get too tired of what they’re doing.” The Daily 5 components are:

  1. Tech Time with RazKids or SuccessMaker followed by comprehension questions
  2. Work on Words with Wordly Wise with accompanying assessment activities
  3. Work on Writing, which includes free writing such as letter-writing and regular, long-term formal assignments such as research on all things presidential (in preparation for their fall-term field trip to the White House)
  4. Meet with Teacher, which is shared chapter book–reading (of their choice, e.g., Bridge to Terabithia, Esperanza Rising, Because of Winn-Dixie, etc.) that they treat like a book club of about four or five students with group discussion
  5. Read to Self, which can be continuing to read the group book but independently, followed by the opportunity for reflective writing, or reading a book of their own choice

IMG_7142“Some students avoided writing at the beginning of the year, but now they are enjoying their assignments and looking forward to writing, which is huge progress,” said Ms. Stasch.

Global studies, the other subject she teaches, integrates well in the Language Arts classroom and invites independent and group inquiry as well as getting out of the classroom and into the world. A TNCS parent who works in government was able to arrange a special White House tour, so they headed to Washington, D.C. this past November. They also visited various museums depending on what particular unit they were studying. The 4th and 5th grades, for example, when to the National Museum of the American Indian to deepen what they had been learning in class about the First Americans.

In her first few months at TNCS Ms. Stasch has settled in quite well. “I’m happy with how things are going,” she said. “The first couple of weeks were focused on routines—getting into the flow of things. Now I think the students are in a more secure place and understanding what’s expected of them.” Teaching the diverse student personalities and learning styles—not to mention mixed-age classrooms—has also been a rewarding experience for her. Her past work experience includes teaching from Kindergarten through 7th grade, but “differentiating instruction when the grades are all together is quite different,” she said. “I’m enjoying that; it’s a lot of fun to be able to see all the different things I can do within classes and across levels.” It has served her well in other ways, too. From her student teaching and her substituting background, she thought she had settled on her ideal age-group of 2nd- and 3rd-graders. “But teaching 4th and 5th grades has been eye-opening,” she said. “I didn’t think I wanted to go that high, but the independence of the older group is great and allows us to take on more advanced projects. The older group surprised me.”

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Planners keep TNCS elementary students on task and on track.

That last statement has a somewhat wistful note, as some of those students will be moving on to Middle School soon, regarding which Ms. Stasch says she has been working hard to get the students ready for this transition. “What I’m focusing on is building skills, responsibility, organization, accountability. This grade level represents a fairly large jump in academic responsibility from what they were doing even last year, so they need to be prepared.” She has the 4th- and 5th-grade students use planners and be more self-motivated about completing and turning in their homework assignments, rather than relying on parents to organize them.”

Regarding homework, she has struck a nice balance between not overburdening students each night and creating assignments that can be augmented by parents should they feel their kids need more practice in certain areas. All of these things can be communicated via the planners, which also act as a conduit between Ms. Stasch and parents.

With 2015 behind us, Ms. Stasch has the winter and spring of 2016 brimming with engaging and inspiring academic explorations. Stay tuned to see what great new things TNCS elementary students will be doing!