Tell Us About You Tuesday

Hi everyone! I'm linking up with Freebielicious again for Summer Fun Week! Today is "Tell Us About You Tuesday"!

My name is Kaia and this will be my fifth year teaching. I graduated from the University of Washington in 2009 with an Anthropology major, and went to City University for a one year Masters in Teaching program. I am a huge science nerd and love learning. During my undergrad I studied everything from dinosaurs to Earth and space sciences. I especially love bones and I get a little too excited when I find animal bones in the wild!

Studying fossils at UW

I always knew I wanted to be a teacher and I taught swimming lessons as my first job in high school. I taught ages 3-5 mainly and I loved it. I knew I wanted to work with the littlest learners!

During my teaching career, I've taught a 1st and 2nd grade combo class, 1st grade, and kindergarten. I wanted to just start and stay with kindergarten but I'm so thankful for the opportunity to see where my kindergarteners are going. I feel like I know so much more about first and second grade and what they are expected to do. I would strongly suggest switching it up sometimes! This will be my third year in kindergarten and I'm excited about all the great new things happening in our district for K. There is a huge PreK-Grade3 push happening and there is so much professional development and learning to be had about catching our kids up so they can be successful in the later grades (and in life!).

When I'm not teaching I love to play computer games. I'm currently [still] playing World of Warcraft. My mains are a priest healer and a pally tank if that means anything to you :) I'm also a big Star Wars fan and I'm SO EXCITED for the new movie to come out in December!!

Another hobby of mine is cosplay. Cosplay is dressing up like your favorite characters... basically like Halloween but anytime! I make costumes for comic, video game, and anime conventions. I really love it and with I had more money to make even more awesome costumes. Last April I met my favorite voice actor, Johnny Yong Bosch at SakuraCon. I waited for FIVE HOURS on EASTER SUNDAY to meet him and it was so worth it! He was such a champ and stayed to meet everyone in line.

Me as Bulma from DBZ with JYB

Anyway, that's enough about me. I'm terrible at talking about myself! If you want to learn more about other teachers, head over to Freebielicious to link up!