About Me

Meredith White earned her B.A., B.S., M.Ed., and Ed.S. all in World Language Education from the University of Georgia. Her focus on novice learners works to ingrain proficiency, authentic resources, genuine tasks, student-guided thematic units, and making language learning enjoyable. When she isn't at PRHS teaching Spanish, she's at Georgia State University teaching educational methods classes or presenting/attending state, regional, and national workshops. Passionate about sharing and collaborating with other teachers, she blogs, moderates the PLN #langchat, and serves on the GGC College of Education Advisory and SEALLT Executive Boards.

Keeping the ¡Fácil! in Facilitate: Classroom Discourse and Proficiency Culture
711 visits
8 comments
Posted by
Posted in

Keeping the ¡Fácil! in Facilitate: Classroom Discourse and Proficiency Culture

“Is this for a grade?”  “Are we turning this in?”  “I was gone, did we do anything important yesterday?”  Sigh. These student utterances are a tale as old as time for teachers. And, while they may be frustrating, they’re also indicative of other things happening (or missing) in the classroom culture and/or discourse. Expressing the […]

My To-Don’t List
4,408 visits
8 comments
Posted by
Posted in

My To-Don’t List

Whew. Fall semester is over, and it has officially been zero days since I showered and changed into real clothes clean pajamas. The stuff of teacher vacation dreams, right? Besides chugging hot chocolate, only eating food that should come with a side of Lipitor, and bingeing Netflix, I’ve also been coming back to the same […]

The Joneses Get a Bad Name
554 visits
3 comments
Posted by
Posted in

The Joneses Get a Bad Name

Usually, when someone mentions that someone else is “keeping up with the Joneses!” they’re implying that someone else is only doing something for the sake of impressing others, saving face, putting on airs, etc. My father tells the story, as it was told to him by my great grandparents, of them passing their neighbors’ house […]

New Year’s Revolutions
949 visits
5 comments
Posted by
Posted in

New Year’s Revolutions

Whew, here comes 2018! Can you believe it? New year, new you? New students? New routines? For some, all of the above; for others perhaps none, or one. I teach on block schedule, so when we come back to school in January, I have all new students, a new prep, and a new schedule. I […]

Highlight Reel Or Highlight Real?
3,811 visits
9 comments
Posted by
Posted in

Highlight Reel Or Highlight Real?

Whew. I’m tired just thinking of all that went into this semester, and I’m not actually sure how it all got done. Beyond just thinking, I find that reflection, true, intentional, pointed reflection, is critical, and as tiring as anything else. Coming off of ACTFL weekend recently and looking into various PD endeavors for the […]

Don’t Get It Twisted
1,610 visits
4 comments
Posted by
Posted in

Don’t Get It Twisted

As we kick off another school year, a lot of topics are swirling about in department meetings, district PD, online forums, Twitter, workshops, and more. This organization system or that one, new seating charts or going deskless, standards-based grading or category percentages, and much more. But, as Rihanna tells us, don’t get it twisted. There […]

Can It Wait?
1,236 visits
3 comments
Posted by
Posted in

Can It Wait?

We know that teachers make a lot of decisions, many of them split-second and with a lot to consider. In all of that question answering, however, I think we as teachers sometimes forget to do some of the asking. Coupled with that is how hard it can be to prioritize and decide when assessing if […]

‘Tis The Season
627 visits
5 comments
Posted by
Posted in

‘Tis The Season

Just like magic, standup comedy, sports, and talk shows, effective teaching can look organic and improvised to the naked eye. Experts in those fields, however, know the amount of preparation, precision, and rehearsal that those require. Effective teaching and learning are no different, and actually draws many uncanny parallels. Some elements are highly contextual in […]