Amy Macaleer incorporates fun and innovative activities to help students learn geometry, calculus and functional trigonometry at Battlefield High School in Haymarket. Her toolbox of creative lesson plans and successful teaching strategies includes a highly popular activity based on the game Pictionary, in which students draw geometric figures without speaking, and an exercise in which students write their name in an artistic manner to demonstrate line or point symmetry. Teaching all levels of proficiency, Macaleer individualizes her instruction to reach every student, challenging those at the highest level of calculus while helping lower-level math students before, during and after school. When a teacher left the school mid-year, Macaleer took over her Algebra II class, boosting morale, communicating with parents and motivating students. At the end of the course, all 26 students passed the state's Standards of Learning (SOL) exam. As the school's lead mentor, Macaleer provides training and leadership to more than 30 new teachers and their mentors each year. She is also team leader for subject-specific groups such as geometry, calculus and functional trigonometry.
2001 James Madison University, B.S.
