It is such an honor to teach at ORLA Montessori! I love my co-workers, families, and students and I love getting to work within such a unique and child-centered culture of learning. I grew up in the Pacific Northwest and went to a Montessori Children’s House when I was young, thus began my passion for nature and for learning.
My journey to teaching included a lot of informal teaching and community work before becoming a certified teacher. I worked for two years as a non-violence literacy and poetry coach for students from many cultural and economic backgrounds in Seattle. After that, I hosted author events at Elliott Bay Book Company and trained new staff members. I met my husband, Chris Sabatini, working at the bookstore and we then moved to Olympia so I could pursue a Master in Teaching degree at The Evergreen State College. Go Geoducks! We fell in love with Olympia and now we never plan to live anywhere else. Once hired at ORLA, I studied the Montessori method at the Montessori Educational Institute of the Pacific Northwest. I’m now in my 4th year of teaching Lower Elementary at ORLA.
In my classroom I believe in establishing a student-led community— students develop the routines, community conversations, jobs, and resources that they think they need to have safety and success at school. Both the Montessori method of teaching and the students I work with, inspire me to keep my eyes open, to observe and to fan the flame of excitement that I see in students every day.