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LEF PROUDLY ANNOUNCES OUR 2006
SUMMER FELLOWS
Thirteen teachers from Lexington Public Schools have
received mini-grants of up to $4,000 to attend conferences
and workshops and participate in research programs. These
educational opportunities will enhance their teaching and
enliven their classrooms.
 Janice
Williams, George Shannon, Karen Boudreau, William Babcock
Health and Physical Education Teachers
Clarke Middle School
These Clarke Middle School physical education teachers will
gear up this summer at a workshop on Project Adventure in
Beverly, MA. Clarke’s Project Adventure equipment and
challenge course, previously funded by LEF, is an integral
part of the physical education curriculum and allows
students, staff and community members to improve their
teamwork and collaboration skills. This three-day workshop
will increase the teachers’ knowledge of activities and
skills for the equipment, as well as allow them to meet new
state regulations for challenge course instruction.
 Albert
Roos
Mathematics Teacher
Lexington High School
Viewing his fellowship “as an opportunity to teach an old
dog new tricks,” veteran LHS math teacher Albert Roos will
attend a Summer Institute for Professional Development for
Mathematics Educators at Mills College in Oakland, CA. After
participating in the week-long course on “Exploring
Statistics with Fathom,” Roos will use his newfound
knowledge to unlock and exploit this powerful statistical
computer software tool in his AP Statistics courses at LHS
next fall.
 Richard
Comeau
Sixth-Grade Science Teacher
Diamond Middle School
Diamond science teacher Rick Comeau will be on
top of the world this summer as he spends five weeks working
with scientists at the Mount Washington Weather Observatory
in New Hampshire, site of the some of the most extreme
weather recorded in North America. Comeau will have the
opportunity to study weather content and concepts, and to
learn about new scientific software and technology. He also
will use his carefully recorded data of the directionality
of sunrise and sunset to deepen his own knowledge and to
expand the sixth grade science curriculum unit on earth,
moon, sun and shadows.
 Melissa
Buttaro
Guidance Counselor
Lexington High School
Each year, LHS helps hundreds of seniors find the
right colleges and sends increasing numbers of students to
international universities. At the prestigious Oxford
Roundtable at Oxford University in England, an
invitation-only forum studying current issues facing state
and national systems of education, Melissa Buttaro will make
a presentation on “One School's Program for Preparing
Students and Parents for the College Application Process and
Experience,” and learn first-hand about international
universities and application processes. By gaining valuable
exposure for LHS and its students and sharing her experience
with her guidance department colleagues, Buttaro will make
information on international admission policies and
post-secondary opportunities available to over 900 LHS
upperclassmen.
 Rosanne
Barbacano
Second-Grade Teacher
Bowman Elementary School
Rosanne Barbacano will be attending the four-day
Summer Institute on Writing at Columbia University, studying
current and effective practices in writing and writing
instruction for elementary students. Designed to help
teachers turn classrooms into “richly literate” reading and
writing workshops, Barbacano hopes to return from the
Institute with “ways to foster a love of reading and writing
into each school day.” In the fall, she also plans to hold a
writing workshop for staff and provide collaborative
coaching for other elementary teachers.
 Sarah
Boys Widhu
Library Media Specialist
Harrington Elementary School
Reading and writing aren’t only about the words
on the page, as Library Specialist Sarah Boys Widhu well
knows. This summer, Widhu will participate in the Picturing
Writing Workshop in Durham, NH. This dynamic
art-and-literature-based approach to writing, introduced
school-wide at Harrington this year through an LEF grant,
helps all levels of writers write more descriptively by
using their own artwork as inspiration and subject matter.
This fall, Widhu will work closely with classroom teachers
to identify books and literature in the Harrington library
which can be integrated with Picturing Writing to support
every part of the curriculum.
 Norma
Gordon
Mathematics Teacher
Lexington High School
Every school day, teachers meet students with a
range of educational needs and learning styles. In order to
explore in-depth the intricacies of teaching adolescents,
LHS math teacher Norma Gordon will attend a week-long course
at the Cape Cod Institute on “Neurodevelopmental Variation
and Learning Disorders in Childhood and Adolescence”,
examining the cognitive issues that affect learning for
special needs students. Says Gordon, “ I am passionate about
increasing my knowledge regarding how students learn and
understand; attending this course will enable me to better
plan teaching and assessment strategies, with the goal of
ensuring the best and most successful experience for my
students.”
 Anne
Carey
Physical Education and Fine Arts Teacher
Lexington High School
Exploring the idea of “teenage search for self
through art”, Carey will be researching the ‘Swinjugend’ or
Swing Kids of Hamburg, Germany, a WWII anti-Nazi youth
movement that used swing dance as a springboard for
non-violent protests. Carey will travel to London and
Germany to examine recently recovered original documents and
participate in swing dance classes, expanding her
understanding of this political and social arts-based
protest movement. This fall, Carey will develop a multimedia
participatory dance workshop based on the history of the
Hamburg Swing Kids for the more than 600 LHS students who
participate in Carey’s dance classes annually.
 Steve
Bogart
Drama Teacher
Lexington High School
This summer, Bogart will be attending the
renowned 14th Annual Last Frontier Theatre Conference in
Valdez, Alaska. Working in a creative collaborative setting
with other playwrights, actors and directors from around the
world, Bogart will participate in play readings and
critiques, performances, master classes, and panel
discussions. The experience will directly impact the classes
taught by Bogart at LHS, including Playwriting and Directing
and Drama of Social Issues, and self-scripting student
workshops. “My participation in the conference,” says
Bogart, “will provide me with more tools and approaches to
help empower my students’ ‘authentic voice’ in dramatic
writing”.
 Carolyn
Sheild
Seventh-Grade Science Teacher
Clarke Middle School
After being named “Teacher at Sea” by the
Students Experiments at Sea (SEAS) program, Carolyn Sheild
will be an “off-season” Summer Fellow, spending a month in
January 2007 off the west coast of Mexico working alongside
scientists aboard the Wood Hole research vessel, Atlantis.
During the research cruise, Sheild’s students will become
directly involved with the research experience through
“Classroom to Sea” labs, monitoring the website
http://www.ridge2000.org/SEAS
and comparing data gathered in their own environment with
data collected during deep-sea dives of the Alvin submarine.
“My going (on the cruise) makes it all the more real to
them,” says Sheild of her students; “Not only can I report
on what’s happening, when it is happening, but it gives them
a way to be there.”
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