Life before Girton
- St Francis Primary School in Nathalia (2011) – Certificate IV in Education Support
- La Trobe University Wodonga – Bachelor of Human Services Master of Social Work (2012)
- La Trobe University Bendigo – Bachelor of Physical and Health Education (2013-2016)
- Girton Grammar School – Integration Aide (2014-2016), Year Two and Year Three teacher (2017-2021), Physical Education teacher and Head of the Physical Education Department (current)
What I Love about Teaching
Teaching provides an opportunity to reach a significant amount of young people to support them in navigating the emotional rollercoaster of life. By seeing students frequently at school, and often sharing in some of their most challenging early life experiences, it gives me a chance to empower people through difficult times.
I also love teaching students to be physically active and adopt healthy lifestyles, as I believe it is the foundation to a long and healthy life and addressing the growing concern for youth mental health. By focusing on ourselves physically, we can unlock the various doors to our other dimensions of health and wellbeing.
What do you like best about the subject/s you teach?
Those students who have a passion for travelling, learning about the world, adopting healthy behaviours, creating behavioural change, public health promotion, developing an awareness of the challenges of achieving optimal health and wellbeing globally and those working to improve it, would love Health and Human Development. Students can go onto work in health promotion, policy making, all fields of health science such as Nursing, Psychology, and Social Work as the course encompasses foundations for Health Science degrees.
Learning how to ‘first move well, then move often’ through our Sports Excellence Program empowers students to develop habits and techniques for long-term athletic development. I enjoy teaching students in the gym so that they can be lifelong trainers, prevent injury and use their knowledge and skills as a tool for managing their mental health.
My favourite classroom activity
Teaching students in Sports Excellence brings me fulfilment as I love encouraging the students to embrace hard work and challenging themselves physically. I believe when we get outside of our comfort zone in physical training, we develop a lot of incredible qualities such as resilience, determination, persistence and boosting our self-esteem. These qualities are so fundamental to our mental health, so I love sharing this growth physically and mentally with students.
What difference can good teaching make?
Everyone remembers people who have had an influence in their lives. I was fortunate enough to have a couple of incredible teachers at school and mentors at university that had a significant impact on my life and drastically changed its course. Without these people, my perception of the world would have been different and the challenges I faced would have been unmanageable. Good teaching not only increases students’ ability to access more through their knowledge, but it has the potential to contribute to inspiring amazingly well-rounded and resilient people.
Other Hats
One of my biggest passions is hospitality work and I love making coffee and serving food. I thoroughly enjoy interacting with people from all over the world, hearing their stories about life, listening to their passions, and generally enjoying the revitalisation that sharing positivity with people in hospitality environments brings.
I am also an avid traveller and have been to 13 different countries and look forward to seeing many more. I am passionate about health and fitness and play football locally for Golden Square and enjoy spending my spare time running and swimming. Finally, I enjoy all kinds of music and enjoy seeing live music in all its forms.
