About Mrs. Sparks

My name is Florencia Sparks.  This is my 20th year of teaching, and I love my job!  The only thing I don't like about my job is waking up early.  I've never been a morning person, but you can't complain when you get all major holidays off and 10 weeks off in the summer, right?

I was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina.  My dad was an engineer in the automotive industry and when I was 6 years old we moved to the metro-Detroit area, so I grew up in southeastern Michigan.  I graduated from Oakland University twice, once with a bachelor's degree and once with a Master of Arts in Teaching.  I moved to Las Vegas in 2006 when I was very lucky enough to be offered a teaching job here at Coronado High School, and I've taught here ever since.  I'm certified to teach Social Studies and Spanish and in the past I've taught Spanish 1 & 2, Psychology, one quarter of P.E., Student Council, and regular and Honors U.S. Government.  Now I'm teaching this awesome Teaching & Training program of study for students who think they might want to be teachers or work in Education or even corporate training someday.  

My husband is a teacher too and we are living proof that you can be a teacher and even marry another teacher and not be completely broke. Don't let the salary thing hold you back from becoming an educator.  With the new CCSD teacher pay scale, it's actually pretty good pay!  One thing you'll learn about me is that I LOVE kids.  We have 3 kids and I love spending time with them and with my nieces and nephews who live in Michigan and Montana (where my husband is from).

I love being a teacher and I hope you'll love my class, even if you decide you don't want to be a teacher.  The cool thing about it is, most people experience the school system twice in their lives.  Once when they're in school, and once when they have kids.  This class will help you understand more about children and their development and about how schools work and why teachers and schools do what they do.  So it should be useful to you in the future regardless of whether you want to be a teacher.