Maryann Woods-Murphy

Maryann Woods-Murphy is a Gifted and Talented specialist in New Jersey and has been teaching for 38 years. She is also the 2010 New Jersey Teacher of the Year, the winner of the Martin Luther King Birthday Celebration Award, a 2011-2012 Washington Teaching Ambassador Fellow, an America Achieves Fellow (2011-2015), a member of both the Board of Directors of the National Education Association Foundation and the Northeast Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. Woods-Murphy earned her Ed.D. in Teacher Leadership at Walden University in 2016 with a study on the way New Jersey teachers improve schools. She has co-chaired Teens Talk about Racism for 13 years with retired science teacher, Theadora Lacey. In her free time, she writes, travels and spends time with family, especially her two granddaughters, Olvyia and Victorya.

Posts By Maryann Woods-Murphy

Diversity

Forget About the Pipeline, School Discipline Is Already a Prison for Many Students

As I walked past the principal’s office, I could see that Jonah was sitting outside again, his small legs shaking nervously, his head hung low. His eyes met mine as I passed by to pick up my mail....

Parents

Students With Autism Are 'Different, Not Less,' and Other Lessons From Temple Grandin

Steven was my oversized and freckled first-grade classmate. That basement classroom was bulging with students, with rows of tiny desks brimming with books and a teacher who liked order. We were to be...

Teaching

We're Just Hoping All These Active Shooter Drills Don't Become Reality in Our Schools

The glue gun was heating up in the corner to affix the last popsicle stick on the fifth grader’s biomimicry project. “Bio” means life and “mimicry” means imitate so students were creating inventions...

Parents

Listen to Parents, Even When You Don't Feel Like It

At the end of a long day, the last thing I'm looking for is a long and detailed email from a parent. Not that I don’t value good communication with parents, but usually I feel exhausted and am still...

student achievement

We Need to Keep Our Most Advanced Students Engaged. Here’s How.

I am a gifted and talented specialist for a school district in New Jersey. It is my job to make sure that students receive the proper level of acceleration and enrichment in elementary school. But...

Teaching

Teens Talk About Racism

Martina, a high school sophomore, told her teacher she was nervous about talking with students from other schools about race. As she boarded the yellow school bus to participate in the annual Teens...

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