Teacher - auburn.k12.il.us



NAME: Lynnette Bialas

SCHOOL: Auburn Middle School

CLASS: Sixth Grade Social Studies

SCHOOL PHONE: 438-6919

SCHOOL EMAIL: lbialas@auburn.k12.il.us

About The Teacher

This is my twenty-second year teaching in the Auburn School District, the seventh at Auburn Middle School. My first fifteen years of experience were at Auburn Elementary School where I taught both second and third grades. For the next five years I taught social studies to four sections of sixth graders and reading to my homeroom class. With our new annexation and a newly added fifth section of sixth graders last year, I then began a new phase of my career with teaching only social studies to the five sections of sixth graders at AMS.

I earned a degree in both Psychology and Education from the former Sangamon State University in Springfield. I finished my Master’s Degree in Elementary Education from Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville in 2005.

My family and I were residents of Auburn for fourteen+ years. We moved in May of ‘06 to Taylorville, my husband’s hometown. Both sides of our families live in the Christian County area. My husband, Bret, and I have two sons, Joshua & Matthew. Josh graduated from Auburn High in 2002, enrolled in the Air National Guard and recently finished tech training as a cardiopulminary lab apprentice in Texas, California, and Ohio. He is currently enrolled at SIUE and is in his third year of the nursing program. Matthew is a sophomore at Taylorville Senior High School. We have one dog, a Golden Retriever from the Backes family of Auburn, named Gauge.

I enjoy spending time with my family and friends. We have a lake lot where we like to spend weekends boating, tubing, fishing, and swimming. Our new residence is also on a private lake so every day I feel like I wake up on vacation:) I love to golf, ski in the winter, and play volleyball whenever I get the opportunity (which isn’t too often anymore...probably my age:).

Mission For The Class

My hope is to make the sixth grade Social Studies curriculum interesting for the students through various activities (simulations, tradebooks, technological sources, and even art whenever possible). I entered this new assignment seven years ago with dreaded memories of my own sixth grade social studies’ experience. I recalled activities that included reading the text, completing the chapter questions, testing, and then repeating the same process over again for the next chapter. YUCK!!!!

This year the students will be working in small groups, in partnerships, independently, and through grand conversations with the entire class. It is my belief that we can learn much from our peers through cooperative groups, but that we must also apply ourselves and show growth through individual assignments as well.

It is also my goal to teach and strengthen nonfiction reading strategies & skills which support the students’ use and comprehension of nonfictional text. It is this type of text that the students will continue to encounter for their remaining years as students and in everyday situations as adults. Along with these literacy skills I think it is important to teach beginning research skills and other study skills, such as outlining to better prepare the students to become life long learners.

Geography skills are also emphasized throughout the year so that students have a better idea of the location of many of the events that are currently impacting our world. I think students are quite surprised at their world geography knowledge by the end of the year!

I am hoping for another successful and rewarding school year.

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