Gina D'Antonio-Spears

Gina D'Antonio-Spears has been teaching dance in Chicago Public Schools since 1998.   During her career, she has taught all grade levels of dance, PreK through 12th grade, teaching elementary school dance for the majority of her career.  Her specialties include unit and lesson planning, assessment, arts integration, differentiation, and questioning and discussion techniques.  She especially enjoys integrating dance history into her lessons at every grade level.  Ms. Spears provides her students with a rich dance curriculum that is standards-based and well-rounded.

Ms. Spears believes that all students can dance and should be provided with a dance education.  Her mission is to expose students to the joy of movement, helping her students become creative thinkers, problem solvers, and the future audiences for dance.  She hopes that one day all Chicago Public Schools will have a certified dance teacher and program.

Ms. Spears is a teacher leader in CPS in a variety of capacities.  She is a Framework Specialist, developing resources and leading professional development connected to the Danielson Framework for Teaching.   She is an Arts Instruction Specialist, leading dance professional development and co-facilitating the dance Community of Practice group.  She mentored two dance resident teachers in the first Dance Teacher Residency program last school year.  She mentors first-year arts teachers in the New Teacher Cohort and has been a mentor for the National Dance Education Organization for all seven cohorts.  Ms. Spears has a vision that through leading dance educators, she can help make the current dance programs in CPS stronger and help the district to invest in more programs throughout the district.

When not teaching, leading professional development, or mentoring, Ms. Spears enjoys exploring Chicago with her children, attending live performances, and taking long walks through Portage Park, the neighborhood where she works and lives.