Mrs. Hanson |  Sixth Grade  |  Ascent Classical Academy of Northern Colorado

ABOUT ME

Born in Boulder but raised on the western slope, I have an abiding love for the mountains and am grateful to live in Colorado. I have a Bachelor of Arts in English from Fort Lewis College, and I obtained a teacher license from Colorado Mesa University. I taught Junior English and AP Literature at Rifle High School for 8 years, before pausing my teaching career to study nutrition and holistic health. While I was pursuing nutrition studies, I worked for the Colorado River District and then moved back to the front range where I worked in environmental education in Boulder County schools.  After becoming a mom, I homeschooled my sons in the Charlotte Mason method until we all came to Ascent in 2024. I have been working in education in some capacity for 15 years.  This will be my fourth year teaching 6th grade at Ascent. 

When I am not planning lessons, you can find me on a trail or beside a river with my two sons; reading from the always revolving stacks of books around my house;  watching my boys play basketball; walking with Mrs. Parker; or working to improve my very amateur gardening and baking skills.   

PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION

 An Emily Dickinson poem changed my philosophy of education. Truly, it changed the way that I think about life. I was teaching AP Literature when I stumbled upon it, and it captured-far more eloquently than I had ever been able to-something that I felt about the way many systems operate within our world. 

"Split the Lark — and you'll find the Music —

Bulb after Bulb, in Silver rolled —

Scantilly dealt to the Summer Morning

Saved for your Ear when Lutes be old.

Loose the Flood — you shall find it patent —

Gush after Gush, reserved for you —

Scarlet Experiment! Sceptic Thomas!

Now, do you doubt that your Bird was true?

In the poem, Dickinson writes honestly about a scientist who splits a lark to find its song.  The poem shows that when we dissect and obsessively compartmentalize for the sake of science or progress, we miss or even injure the whole. At that time, I had begun to feel that was happening within our school. We were dissecting and measuring and mining best educational practices to meet standardized testing outcome goals-not to meet the needs of a virtuous person. We were dissecting the bird to find its song, but we were killing the bird in the process. 

What's the bird? A wholly living, breathing being responding to life with song. From the moment they are born, children are imbued with a longing learn. Education should satiate that longing in content and classroom atmosphere--providing truths for them to learn and beauty for them to consider with wonder. The classroom should be a place rich in beauty. The curriculum should contain a wealth of knowledge and truth for students to consider.  Educators should provide for students the habits that lead to self-discipline, so that the learners are able to extend their education beyond the walls of the classroom.

However, beyond content and structure, habits that create attentive learners are rooted in relationship. The relationship between teacher and student should be one of shared respect.  As a teacher, I see each student as a wholly unique being, deserving of my respect and capable of growth beyond my imagining. My hope is to let them know that they are an integral part of our classroom, and that I care about them and the future they may have. Through this care, I hope to foster a love for what I love---the excitement in pursuing challenging math problems, the beauty of great works of literature, the reverence I feel when I read about great men and women throughout history, and wonder whenever I consider natural sciences as we learn our place in the order of things. 

Education should be life-giving. We should lay before them a rich feast from which their hearts and minds are nourished.  Education should be a practice that we lend our participation and effort toward, until it becomes a craft--both learning and teaching. I still have much to learn here, but you can be sure I will be making my best effort to learn to teach well.  Education should foster meaningful relationships--between student and teacher; between class and subject matter; between school and life. These relationships and the communities where we build them should encourage us toward becoming our best selves. For as one of my educational heroes said, 

“The question is not, – how much does the youth know? when he has finished his education – but how much does he care? and about how many orders of things does he care? In fact, how large is the room in which he finds his feet set? and, therefore, how full is the life he has before him?”-Charlotte Mason 

I also  believe our culture often underestimates our young students’ capacity to learn timeless truths and appreciate goodness and beauty.  My hope is to place before students things that are excellent and virtuous and to equip them with the tools they need to read with comprehension, write with precision, and think with discernment.  Pursuing these things in the classroom will help us move toward accomplishing our vision as a school:  

To develop the moral and intellectual skills, habits, and virtues upon which independent, responsible, and joyful lives are built, in the firm belief that such lives are the basis for a free and flourishing republic.

It is my great privilege to partner with you in the education of your child.

WHAT I'M LOOKING FORWARD TO

I'm looking forward to sharing the beauty of the great books we will read in literature. I hoping to encourage students to  embrace the challenge of math and explore  scientific ideas. I am also  looking forward to watching students grow as writers and thinkers across disciplines. This will be a year of growth!

WHAT I'M READING

*Everything Sad is Untrue by Daniel Nayeri

*The Unabridged Count of Monte Cristo (Finding what is left out of the abridged to better teach the novel)

*Norms and Nobility by David Hicks