Jessica's School Site

Biography

As a preschooler, my favorite game to play was "school". I was always the teacher. Now at 22-years-old, I have a preschool classroom to call my own. My interest in teaching began when I was sixteen and teaching tennis to ten-year-old children in my hometown of Suffern, New York. My boss thought I'd be good with the pee-wees (3-to-5-year-olds), so she asked me to teach them for the remainder of the summer. I instantly fell in love with the curiosity, honesty, and innocence of young children. I continued teaching pee-wee tennis until I went to college. When arriving at the University of Massachusetts Amherst for my undergraduate degree, Education was not a major. I settled for Communication and decided to complete a minor in Education focusing on early childhood. During my semester abroad in London, United Kingdom, I had an internship in the hospital schoolroom of St. Mary's Hospital of Chelsea and Westminster. Though the children were very sickly, they often noted that the best part of the day was coming to the schoolroom. They enjoyed learning, doing activities, and the fact that the teachers were not probing them with needles or taking their temperatures. While it was a difficult experience to work with very sick children, it was also so rewarding to work with children that had so much passion for learning. It is four months of my life that I will never forget.		After returning from London, it was decided that I would pursue a career in Early Childhood Education. I immediately went to the UMass Center for Early Education and Care (CEEC) and applied for an assistant teaching position for the fall semester. I landed the position and started at the end of August. I worked in the mixed age (2.9-years-old to 5-years-old) preschool classroom with two lead teachers and several undergraduate assistant teachers. After working in the classroom for six months, I knew I wanted to work with preschoolers. Due to the amazing staff at the UMass CEEC and my mentor from the UMass School of Education, Claire Hamilton, I was able to turn my assistant teaching into student teaching. I stayed in the same preschool classroom for the spring semester, but was able to be a part of the lead teaching team. I was able to learn about and assist with lesson plans, activities, problem-solving, and parent communication. Nothing could have better prepared me for what I've experienced thus far post-college. I currently work as a lead preschool teacher at Kehillath Israel Nursery School in Brookline, Massachusetts. I am also obtaining my Masters in Early Childhood Education for Students With and Without Disablities at Lesley University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. I have had a wonderful and enriching experience in the classroom thus far. I am eager to keep learning and growing as a teacher as my career continues.

Jessica's School Site

Biography