Steffani H. Gilligan is currently a School Standards Coach
at Spring Park Elementary School in Jacksonville, FL. She has also been a
Standards Coach at Brentwood Elementary School of the Arts and Norwood
Elementary. Her primary focus is literacy instruction for both faculty and
students. Her career in education began in 1990 upon completion of a bachelor’s
degree in Elementary Education from Florida State University. In 1995, she was
offered a marketing and recruitment position with the Magnet Programs Office of
Duval County Public Schools. She earned a master’s degree in Educational
Leadership in 1996 and continued her work with marketing for 8 years. Mrs.
Gilligan is also nationally certified to teach in a Montessori school setting.
In June 2005 she discovered poetry.
Duval County Public Schools was recently awarded a federal
grant to increase the arts opportunities for the students of Brentwood
Elementary through an integrated arts program. (The classroom teachers use the
arts to strengthen reading, math and content area lessons. The arts teachers
make natural connections to the academics.) A key component of the grant was
teacher training. In June 2005, the faculty and staff participated in arts
training at the University of North Florida. One session taught the teachers
performance poetry. Her training lay dormant until October 2005 when she
attended a writing conference that included sessions on poetry. Her first poem
was written during a session that did not hold her attention . . .
Mrs. Gilligan now has about 60 poems written for
elementary school children and teachers. She uses her literacy background and
high interest poems to provide teachers with alternative texts to use for skills
block, poetry centers, shared reading and the content areas. She uses the same
poems to teach writer’s craft to the intermediate students. You may contact her
at steffani@thepoetryteacher.com for more
information.
Steffani stands with a poetry quilt at the Spring Park
Poetry Festival April 2006
ThePoetryTeacher.com
