About Me

After attending a very good private school, I came to the Maryland Institute, College of Art (MICA) to pursue a five-year program, earning a Bachelor's of Fine Arts and Master's in Education. I then spent eight years teaching middle school, (6th8th grade, Visual Art,) both in the city of Baltimore and in a neighboring county. My experience includes work with gifted and talented students between grades 6 and 12.I love words. Like painting and drawing, words describe life, whether internal and emotional or as a more objective sciencea genuine study of what one hears, thinks, and sees. From an online platform, I would be best at editing, as well as helping students develop their writing. My philosophy as a teacher is that one must love three things: learning itself, the subject being taught, and the students one is teaching. Those driving academic forces are combined with interests of identity and empathy. I care very much who a person is and how one can discover who he or she is better. This can be done through writing, drawing, painting, and many other ways. To that end, a major component of my art curriculum became the visual journal, in which the traditional sketchbook, (typically focused on observational drawing,) evolving sketchbook, (incorporating mixed media,) and writing come together. As an artistic tool, the visual journal has been critical to my finding my own voice, and I believe that every student can find themselves in one of the three methods (mixed media, text, or observational drawing) andoften more powerfullyin the combination. When possible, I try to engage students' interests and personalities to create work that is personally meaningful to them. I also utilize humor, particularly dry humor and irony. (I have a playful side also.)Education is a way of life in my home and always has been. In addition to painting professionally, I enjoy reading. Young adult literature is my favorite genre, although I also have an interest in biography, (particularly autobiography,) psychology, andrecentlythe graphic novel. I have a personal goal toward German fluency and am taking beginner's Spanish at a local nonprofit. However, don't mistake me for a natural linguist! Like anybody learning something new, I feel the awkward discomfort of a beginner. That said, I can relate to the discomfort of others who are learning (or struggling through their learning). Developmentally, I work best with adolescents, as the bulk of my teaching experience has been in middle school; however, I would also be comfortable working with college students.__________________If mobility (my own) were not an issue, I would also be happy to teach art, which is best done in person. That, however, would require the student to come to me.

Education & Certifications

Q&A with Michelle

Tutoring Subjects