Hello, my name is Garrett Smith, and I am an undergraduate student at Appalachian State University studying Secondary History Education. I have spent almost all of my life living somewhere along the Blue Ridge Mountains in North Carolina, with my whole childhood being in Sparta North Carolina. Throughout my life, I have always wanted to teach. Showing people how wonderful history and culture can be has always been something I have loved. Across this portfolio you will find curriculums, unit maps, lesson plans, and assessment samples I plan to use when I teach.

Outside of my educational life, art has always been something extremely important to me. I grew up in a household where art was always a focus in someway, whether it was through my family teaching me how to draw, or spending many of my summer afternoons with my mom helping her run an art gallery. Sparta is a town built and focused on art and music. Through all the time I spent with mom working in the art gallery and going to her meetings, I learned how important and vast art can be in other cultures. Growing up in a region where many cultures have come together and interact through art has shown me that culture is one of the most important aspects of life. Learning and experiencing other peoples' culture has always been something that I have loved. Learning one's culture is learning their history, and that is one aspect of my life that has heavily influenced my teaching philosophy.

My teaching philosophy heavily revolves around creating an open and welcoming environment for everyone. To build relationships with students and people in general they need to feel welcome with you to open that pathway, and having my classroom environment welcoming and open is the first step in that. My classroom will be a place for everyone to be able to be open about themselves, their culture, and all aspects of their lives that are important. I want to use my classroom to show my students all the different and wonderful types of cultures, environments, histories, and stories the world has to offer. I hope that when a student leaves my classroom they have felt welcomed, and leave knowing a little bit more about our world's past and present with the hopes of them wanting to explore more.

Here is the most recent version of my resume.