February 15, 2016

To Whom It May Concern:

Please accept my enthusiastic recommendation of Ms. Stephanie Mackey for a
teaching position at your school. Stephanie was my student last year when I taught a
course on elementary and middle school social studies teaching. The course
emphasizes reading and writing strategies for social studies, which students then
directly practice during student-teaching in lessons that they videotape and analyze.
In this way, I watched Stephanie teach a number of times and became part of her
planning process as well.
In our class, Stephanie stood out in a number of ways. First, her teaching
practice is stronger than is typical for a beginning teacher. In the classroom, she is
highly aware of students and how they are learning. She routinely asked me for
suggestions about which types of activities to do with her students or how to assess
their understanding, demonstrating a level of foresight that many beginning
teachers do not have. She also pushed students to think about their own learning.
For instance, I recall her in one video teaching a student to contextualize a primary
source (i.e. to think about the historic context before analyzing the content of the
source), and then going a step further to ask the student why that would be an
important reading skill. There was a visible light bulb moment for this student.
In addition, during my class, Stephanie was paired with one of her classmates
as a co-student-teacher, and for several of their lessons, Stephanie shared her plan
and materials with me via Google Docs, which gave me a front row seat to see
Stephanie and her co-teacher write ideas and questions back and forth as they
planned and fine-tuned each lesson. With this colleague, Stephanie was definitely
the leader but also a great listener and collaborator. In fact, I think she helped make
her colleague a stronger teacher. As they co-planned, Stephanie routinely took great
lessons and kept fine-tuning them to make them even better.
This level of planning and thought contributes to Stephanies success as a
teacher. I am confident that her practice will continue to grow and that she will have
success with many, many students for years to come. I am also sure that as a teacher
at your school, Stephanie will continue to seek out colleagues for feedback and
collaboration and will also distinguish herself as a leader. I wholeheartedly
recommend her as your newest teacher.
Sincerely,
Hillary Greene, Doctoral Student
Graduate Student Instructor
hlgreene@umich.edu