BRANSON MO NEWS: Two Lee’s Summit faculty members — Lee’s Summit West High School’s Rhonda Ireland and Prairie View Elementary School’s Aimee Fresia — have earned state Teacher of the Year honors in their respective subject areas.
Ireland, who will be honored Feb. 23 as Teacher of the Year by the Missouri Council for Social Studies, teaches International Baccalaureate History of the Americas and Advanced Studies World History. The social studies organization commended her as a strong advocate of student choice, for connecting history with modern events and for encouraging diversity.
Ireland says the R-7 district’s promotion of the “workshop model” of instruction has dramatically changed her teaching style.
“It is a difficult shift in that students are so used to being ‘told’ what they need to learn versus ‘uncovering’ it on their own,” she said. “Workshop requires an incredible amount of upfront planning, an enormous amount of research, lab classroom hosting as well as observation of my small group cadre with focusing on student ownership.”
Ireland has worked in the Lee’s Summit district for 25 years and at Lee’s Summit West for three years.
She mentors others on the workshop model and meets monthly with a group from the Midwest Center for Holocaust Education. She also holds leadership positions in state and national organizations.
Fresia, who was chosen as the Missouri Art Education Association’s Elementary Art Educator of the Year, began teaching at Prairie View in 2007 and also serves as a traveling art teacher at Richardson, Meadow Lane and Summit Pointe elementary schools.
She taught at Johnson Elementary School in the Hickman Mills district from 2000 to 2007 and was that district’s Teacher of the Year in 2003. Fresia has been published nationally, including two articles in “Arts and Activities” and one in “Scholastic.”
She will be honored April 6 in …
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