I'm Anita and here is my story.
I graduated high school in 1996 from Oakhill College, Castle Hill then promptly started studying an advanced science degree at the University of Sydney.
Whilst at university (“Uni” as we call it is Aus) I tutored some local kids in maths and absolutely loved it.
In my final year of uni, I spent a semester overseas on exchange in the USA. I joined the ski and snowboarding club and went to Jackson Hole for spring break. My love for the snow started here.
When I returned home to Australia I moved down to Jindabyne in the snowy mountains and deferred my last semester of uni so I could stay longer. Then I wanted to live a whole season at a ski resort so I moved to Steamboat, Colorado. Wow! What an experience! Whilst in steamboat I had my first taste of ‘teaching’ after I did a short course on becoming a snowboard instructor.
Realising I wasn’t a lab person and more of a people person but with only one more semester to go to finish my degree I returned home to finish it off.
My first job out of uni was with Cisco where I worked in Networks and gained the highly sought after qualifications of CCNA and CCDA. The dotcom bubble burst, I lost my teach job so moved to London with a friend. My older sister was already there. I worked for Flight Centre and London for a year and a half and spent some time travelling around Europe before moving to Whistler for another ski season. Then I thought I better return home to Sydney to get a real job.
My love for maths turned into a job in finance. Working at HSBC and then Macquarie Bank before realising I wanted to become a maths teacher.
So in 2006 I became a uni student once again to do my Dip Ed and started full time teaching of high school mathematics in 2007.
I’ve since taught at Catholic boys schools, St Pauls, Greystanes and Waverley College, a Catholic girls school, St Clare’s college, where I was also the Head of Mathematics and I am now currently working in public education in the eastern suburbs of Sydney at a mixed selective and comprehensive high school.
I have taught every course from year 7 through to year 12 extension 2 with some time off on maternity leave to care for my 2 beautiful daughters.
My most recent role in the learning hub has given me the opportunity to work with students with learning disabilities, helping them fill in the gaps in their knowledge so they can become confident in maths and learn the life skills needed to become financially aware and capable citizens.
Although I love being in the classroom and guiding a whole class to achieve their best whilst catering for a diverse range of abilities, my favourite part of teaching is working one on one or in small groups.
I hope my love for learning rubs off on my students. I love finding new resources and using them with my students to get an aHa moment. Oh how sweet they are!
I love trying new teaching strategies, listening to student conversations and hearing their new understanding of complex concepts. What makes it even more rewarding is when this is reflected in increased assessment results.
My goal in creating this blog is to share my knowledge with students, parents and teachers of the resources I have found to be extremely useful in making a difference.
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