Teacher Spotlight
October 2012

Meet Barb Lahr

Lahr grew in in Pottstown, PA and graduated from Clarion University of Clarion, PA with a BS in elementary education.  She received her Masters of Education in Creative Arts in Learning from Lesley University, MA in 2000 through an outreach program.  When she finished college, she substituted in Pennsylvania, Colorado, and eventually in Gillette, Wyoming.  She was hired to teach the gifted program in Gillette.  Barb later moved into a 6^th grade classroom and settled into a 5^th grade teaching position shortly after, staying in that position for the last 26 years, and teaching for CCSD for 30 years. 

Currently Barb is a 5^th grade teacher at Prairie Wind Elementary School and teaches math, science, language arts, and writing.  She has assisted in her school’s geography bee for the last several years and usually she is the one asking the questions!

Barb personally loves to look at maps and finds them fascinating to study.  On family trips she is the navigator and more often than not is faster than the GPS!  The globe in her classroom is in constant use when she teaches science, reading and when students pose question.  Sometimes, Barb catches her students looking at the globe in her classroom with curiosity, and she enjoys watching their interest about the world grow.

The WGA weekly trivia questions are lots of fun, and she shares the questions with her students using what is supposed to be for teachers for her students to work together weekly.  The current Geo Bee winner is in Barb’s class and they used the weekly questions to give him some practice for the state Geo Bee.  Even though the student did not win, the class is still enthusiastic about the weekly questions and continues to look forward to them.

Barb continues to be excited about geography in her classroom, even though she is not technically a geography teacher she is an example of how geography is part of every subject!