Episode 214: Theatre as a teaching tool The drama classroom is not just a place for games and play time. You can use theatre as a teaching tool - perhaps the most important one students will ever receive. That’s the philosophy of long time drama teacher Michelle Huerta and she has grown and changed over the years as her students have grown and changed. Show Notes Drama Teacher Academy School Daze Episode Transcript Welcome to the Drama Teacher Podcast brought to you by Theatrefolk – the Drama Teacher Resource Company. I’m Lindsay Price. Hello! I hope you're well. Thanks for listening! This is Episode 214. You can find any links to this episode in the show notes which are at Theatrefolk.com/episode214. Today is a lovely conversation. It’s one of those ones that, you know, it starts in one place and ends up in another. You know, I say that and then, well, I suppose all conversations do that, don’t they? We don’t just stay in one place. Otherwise, all the words would just dump all on top of each other and you wouldn’t be able to understand anything. Now, I’m thinking about conversations that tumble on top of each other. This tangent is brought to you by Theatrefolk.com. Our guest today is a 30-year teacher veteran and, frankly, I love what she has to say about being a long-term teacher. I love what she has to say about 21st century students. I love her advice for new teachers and I know that you are going to love it, too. Let’s get to it. I’ll see you on the other side. LINDSAY: Hello everybody! I am so excited today to be talking to Michelle Huerta. Hello, Michelle! MICHELLE: Hi Lindsay! How are you? LINDSAY: Fantastic! First of all, please let everybody know where you are in the world today. MICHELLE: I am in Austin, Texas – very far southwest part of Austin, Texas. LINDSAY: Very nice. How long have you been a teacher? MICHELLE: I have been teaching for over 30 years. LINDSAY: I like the laugh before you thought. It was like, “Oh, my goodness, 30 years.” MICHELLE: Yeah, yeah. LINDSAY: Let’s talk about that for a second. That’s fantastic. How do you feel about teaching for 30 years? MICHELLE: I can’t believe that it’s been that long. It doesn’t seem like it’s been that long. But, whenever I say it, I realize that means I must be old if I’ve been teaching that long. But I love teaching middle school and I’ve been teaching middle school now for about 25 years. LINDSAY: Let’s talk about that for a second. What keeps you teaching? MICHELLE: The kids. I just love working with the kids. I think, middle school, a lot of people go, “Oh, you teach middle school? Oh, my gosh!” but I actually love middle school compared to high school because, in high school, they’re getting to that age a lot of times where they’re a little jaded. They think they’re a little bit too cool. In middle school, there’s still that excitement about learning new things and figuring things out. I really enjoy their enthusiasm and it makes me energized, if that makes any sense. I know a lot of people would think that’s crazy – that it usually makes you tired – but, their energy, I feed off of it. It’s just great. LINDSAY: I think that just means that you’ve actually found and lived the thing you were ...