Babies, from his birth to approx two years of age, learn about the world by their senses and his motor skills. Kids in this stage learn from sensory cues. Let your little one see your smile when he does something you want him to do; let him hear your calm voice when he is scared or not feeling good. In this way, your child learns about their environments.
When your child just begins to talk then he entered the stage where your child is oriented only to the present, he hasn’t learned how to think about his past or future. At this point, your child is still egocentric, seeing only his viewpoint.
The child in the first grade, enter the phase of life, where he begins learning how to think more abstractly. In this stage, he also progresses to the point where he started thinking logically about things he sees.
Stage 4: INFANCY
It is the first year of your child’s life after birth. At this stage, your child is called a newborn baby. This stage has a distinctive appearance, arms and legs are relatively short as the head is very large. Infants are born with certain abilities already developed like they have a well-developed sense of smell; they try to communicate their needs by crying when they are hungry, uncomfortable, lonely, or bored.
· When your little one is of 6 weeks, he typically starts smelling, and starts making vocal sounds, like “ahh”, ”dada”, ”gaga”.
· By 6 months, your child spends a lot of time babbling, he has also learned to sit and starting to crawl.
· By 12 months, your little champ starts saying his first word, he can stand with any help and support and also may have started to walk.
Child development is the process through which human begins typically grow and mature from infancy through adulthood. We believe that investing in our children’s development from the earliest age is the single most important contribution we can make…
Enrichment of vocabulary. It helps in developing a rapport between the child and the teachers. It prepares the child for building his memory and imagination.
STORIES: A COMMUNAL CURRENCY OF HUMANITY
Story telling is the very oldest form of teaching, the story creates magic and a sense of wonder at the world. Children should be told stories again and again, as stories define us, shape us, control us, and make us. Stories help your kids to know and understand the sounds and words, and develop early skills on them. When your child is listening to stories, it sparks his imagination, stimulates curiosity, and also helps your child in the development of his brain, social, and communication skills.
BENEFITS OF STORYTELLING
The story should be told in a dramatized manner or voice, as they love actions and movements. It is also very important to maintain eye contact with the children so that they have the feeling that they are a part of what is happening.
Every human culture in the world is not yet literate, but still, every single culture tells stories. Storytelling is a very unique way for kids to develop an understanding, respect, and appreciation for others and promote a positive attitude to people from different lands, religions, and cultures.
A very big advantage of storytelling is that listening to stories enhances your child’s vocabulary.
EFFECT ON CHILDRENS
When you tell your first story to your child, there is a magical moment. Your child sits enthralled, mouths open, eyes wide, and constantly staring into your eyes.
Children enjoy telling stories. The stories should be REAL stories, not fantasy or fairy tales, the story should be short with simple and easy language along with different pictures. The story should cover the events of daily life, like, there was a child who gets up in the morning, brushes his teeth, washes his face and combs his hair, and so on. There were the good old days when we would lie beside our daadis or naanis, and they read stories for us- the righteousness of the Pandavas, the stories of Vikram and Betaal, and many more. These stories taught us the important lessons of our lives, they taught us about good and bad.
Perfect storytelling is acting out a story. Storytelling parents are found to have a more emotional bond with the children, as storytelling is a creative form of expression where imagination is translated into words.
Feeding to your little one can often be challenging, as several development changes are happening at this time. Toddlers are striving for independence and control and as a result, their growth rate slows down. All these changes make mealtime difficult. So, it is important for us to provide the structure and set limits. We have to provide them regular meals and snacks. If your child refuses to eat food, don’t make a big deal out of it. Try again after some time.
HEALTHY DIETS LEADS TO HAPPY LIFE
Train your child’s body to crave healthy food, as eating is a necessity but eating healthy is an art. Try to serve the food which is easy for your child to eat, by cutting the food into bite-size pieces, making food soft and moist. Always try to avoid foods that are hard to chew and swallow.
HEALTHY FOOD CHOICES
The brain uses more energy than any other organ in the body. Everything from attentiveness to learning and memory, are affected by the food your child consumes. Your child, whose brain is rapidly developing, needs a nutrient-dense diet to help them as they process the world around them. If your child doesn’t get suitable nutrients then they might struggle to develop the skills to maintain concentration, which is increasingly important as they get older.
Create colorful plates containing a variety of vegetables. Your child’s food must contain “calcium” as it strengthens bones, “protein” which helps in building muscles of your child, “carbohydrates” which provides energy to your child and he actively participates in any activity, “iron” which makes healthy blood and at last most importantly “essential fats” as it helps your child’s body to absorb the other vitamins.
EARLY CHILD DEVELOPMENT
In the first five years of your child’s life, his brain develops more and faster than any other time in his life. His early relationships, experiences, and the things which he hears, sees, smells, touches-stimulates his brain, creating millions of connections. This is when the foundation for learning and health throughout life is laid down.
A loving, nurturing relationship helps you and your children to learn more about each other. As he grows up, his needs will change.
Your child’s play is not simply a reproduction of what he has experienced or what he has gone through, but a creative reworking of the impressions he has acquired. The more risks you allow your child to take, the better they learn to look after themselves.
One of the best gifts you can give your child is the ability to play on their own. Instead of worrying about whether we should give our child gold stars for participating in any work or gold stars for being the best child, We have to involve our child in real-world activities where the result is itself a reward to him!
Play is far more powerful for children, however, than many parents realize. It’s the key to learning. Researchers and educators across the world have found that play can help enrich learning and develop key skills such as inquiry, expression, experimentation, and teamwork.
Problem-solving and decision-making skills are stalled when there’s always someone to think for them. Imagination and creativity aren’t relied on when games are always made up by someone else! By now you probably know why it’s important that children play on their own every day. If your kids aren’t used to playing on their own then there will be some adjustment.
Our society has completely lost sight of what’s truly important in life. It’s time to find it again.
Tips to help your child learn to play by themselves
Giving children choices helps them feel like they have some power and control over what they do, and is a step in growing up. Everyone likes to have choices in the things they do. Some child care providers think they need to do all the planning. They forget that children need choices. Some children will just go along with whatever an adult tells them to do. Others will become angry because they aren’t given the chance to choose for themselves. Giving children choices helps them feel like they have some power and control over what they do. It’s a step in growing up.
The more choices your child gets to make while living under your roof the better off they are.
Give your child attention
Everyone at every age needs attention! It feels good when someone focuses his or her full attention on you. Being attentive also feels good for your infant or toddler (and older children). For children, getting attention is even more important than for adults. Children need attention to grow, develop self-esteem and a positive sense of identity, and to flourish and succeed. There’s even research showing that parental attentiveness has a connection to releasing children’s growth hormones.
Don’t jump to accommodate every request
If my child has plenty of things to play with, I’m probably not going to stop what I’m doing to retrieve another toy he wants. This helps him focus on what he’s got instead of thinking of 50 other things he thinks he wants to play with.
Location, Location, Location
The location is not important as long as there’s something for the child to do and some type of boundary in place.
It’s not independent play if they roam around the house and you have to follow them to be sure they aren’t getting into trouble.
Be consistent with independent play and give it time
Independent playtime is something that works best with consistency.
Choose a time that works best and try to have playtime during that time each day so the kids know what to expect.
Knowing what to expect is a huge thing for children, and they are much more likely to participate without a fight if they see it coming.
Start with 5 minutes, 10 minutes, and then work up to 30 minutes or an hour as the child can do so and enjoys it.
Learning to think critically may be one of the most important skills that today’s children will need for the future. In today’s global and rapidly changing world, your children need to be able to do much more than repeating a list of facts: your little champ needs to be critical thinkers who can make sense of information, analyze, contrast, compare and generate higher-order thinking skills.
EXERCISE TO IMPROVE CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS
I am not talking about whether there is any strategy to teach your child how to think critically. Our role is to ask sometimes open-ended questions to guide the thinking process of your child. Allow your child to experiment and refine her theories on what causes thinking to happen.
For developing or helping your child to build a foundation of critical thinking you have to provide him the opportunities to play, offer your child ample time to think, attempt a task. Don’t intervene immediately.
Try to ask him open-ended questions, rather than answers to the questions your child raises to you, help him think critically by asking questions in return: “What is your point of view? What ideas do you have?”. Respect his responses whether in your point of view that was correct or not. You could support him by saying, “yah! That’s interesting, tell me why you think so.” Or by saying, “How would you solve this problem? what’s going in your mind?”
By allowing your child to think differently, you’re helping him to develop their creative problem-solving skills.
PROMOTE CHILDREN’S INTEREST
When your child is deeply vested in any topic or pursuit, they are more engaged and willing to experiment. The process of expanding their knowledge brings about a lot of opportunities for critical thinking, so encouraging this activity helps your child invest in their activity of interests.
Always try to avoid teaching your child to do any task in one certain way, and one way only. It’s worth teaching kids early on about biases. When your kid understands how desires influence their judgment, they learn how bias works and do they avoid it.
In addition to Ofsted ‘s latest Education Inspection Framework (EIF), the term cultural capital has been added. Cultural capital is the fundamental knowledge that children need to be educated people, it is the vital information that children need to prepare them for future success. Many kids arrive at an early year environment with their learning and playing, with different experiences than others.
It’s about giving kids the best possible start to their early age education. It’s the job of setting up to help kids from 0-6 years of age feel the awe and wonder of the world they live in through the seven years of learning. We believe in the value of ensuring equity for children who are cultural and developmental in the early years of the learning environment.
Defining present-day intellectual capital
Three sources of cultural capital Bourdieu identified: objective, embodied, and institutionalized.
Objective: Cultural objects, books, artworks
Embodied: Vocabulary, tastes, mannerisms
Institutionalized: Skills, certificates for the education
More recent research by several scholars on the concept of cultural capital has added scientific, emotional, regional, and subcultural types of cultural capital to this list.
Technical: marketable competencies, e.g. IT
Emotional: empathy, compassion (things companies in management roles can be looking for in employees)
National: ‘Operates on the assumption of the existence of traditions, both high and traditional, which generate and justify a sense of belonging and the occupation of a national governing role … It is a type with a limited exchange value because it is not unusual … in practice, lacking it acts as a handicap, rather than providing a route to profit and preferential possession.’
Subcultural: groups formed around cultural details that involve unique cultural awareness and behaviors for individuals to belong to the sub-set.
In this new sense, ‘Cultural Capital’ is embodied by an individual who has knowledge of a wide range of cultures and is comfortable discussing their value and merits. It is defined by the maturity and capacity to be able to apply the correct information in any given situation: a job interview, a conversation with a neighbor, the creation of a network of work, etc.
The benefits of cultural capital
Evidence shows that the cultural capital passed down by families is helping children in school do better. The education system values the awareness and ways of thinking established by the development of abstract as well as formal cultural capital. As adults, cultural capital allows people to network with other adults with similar information and experiences and, in effect, monitor access to
This system of privilege is defined in their 2009 book Community, Class, Distinction Bennet, et al.
‘This is the reproduction circuit associated with schooling and formal education. Those parents equipped with cultural capital are able to drill their children in the cultural forms that predispose them to perform well in the educational system through their ability to handle “abstract” and “formal” categories. These children are able to turn their cultural capital into credentials, which can then be used to acquire advantaged positions themselves.’
Valuing the cultures of children and families
Each child and family who enters a setting will have their own awareness and experiences that will interact with their community and extended family. This may include cultures, values, customs, family and cultural heritage, interests, travel, and work. Evidence indicates that, if the cultures of children and families are respected, both the learning experience and the success of the child will profit.
(Husain et al., 2018, p. 4 and Gazzard, E. 2018 in Chalmers, H. and Crisfield, E. 201)
What is Montessori ‘s or childminder’s position here?
The children learn from the various people around them about the local society. And here the question comes to mind how the kids know about their native culture as if any are from India how they know about the culture of India?
So, here the role of Montessori or childminder comes into play. Depending on their background, it is really important to give content to children’s which helps children learn their native culture.
Exciting and Stimulating activities of cultural capital
Finding books on a child’s favorite topic Create role-playing games that further their interest in a given idea Take the Park Trips And plan neighborhood events such as police conferences.
When your kid starts learning to write, It can be an exciting and somehow frustrating time. If you don’t try too much too soon, It can be fun for you and your kid as well. Teaching your kid to write depends on many factors such as the ease with which they can hold a pencil or a crayon, their enthusiasm to write or draw, their interest for big and small letters, and many more.
Your toddler may be a keen artist, wanting to write or draw random letters or figures everywhere. But it is our responsibility to teach them to write, which involves more than just stick figure art and random shapes. We have to teach them not to rush to the alphabet, number, or shape. Create simple lines and shapes and ask your little one to simply copy them.
HELP YOUR TODDLER TO WRITE
When we speak, it is a manner in which we express our thoughts to other people, but when we write our thoughts, that means they are being recorded in graphic symbols.
When we write we manifest our thoughts. It is often seen that when people are hesitant to speak, they pass the subject or matter through writing. Writing is the way and means through which we communicate with others. It is a way to release emotional tension.
TEACH YOUR KID TO HOLD A PENCIL
Do you worry that your kid might be gripping the pencil wrong?
Teaching your kid to hold a pencil is no walk in the park. If you start forcing your kid to hold a pencil in a particular way, it might even prove to be a difficult one. It might be even more challenging to teach your kid to hold a pencil the correct way once they develop a grip of their preference. That’s why it is imperative that you teach your little one this important skill at the right time and in the right way.
The grip requires the use of two fingers and a thumb. Teach your kid to grip the pencil by applying equal pressure from all the fingers. Give your child a short pencil, as it is easier for kids to write with short pencils, it allows a better grasp as kids have to pinch their fingers together to hold the pencil firmly.
Writing is a complex action, which involves several acts. These movements are individual efforts and need practice. One part of writing depends upon the preparation of the motor. Mechanism and the other depending upon the preparation of intellect.
STAGES OF PENCIL GRASPING
As your kid grows, they will naturally hold their crayons and pencils in different ways. The way in which a kid holds a pencil depends on how ready their shoulder and arms muscles are. Typically around 1-1.5 years of age, your child starts to develop more control over their shoulder and arm muscles; they will move on to hold a pencil with their fingers. A child develops this grasp typically around 2-3 years old. The child continues to use whole arm movements to scribble with this grasp.
From age 3.5-4 years old, your kid may move on to hold the pencil with three fingers. And at last at the age of 4-6 years, your kid starts grasping the pencil. The fingers of your little one’s now start moving independently and allow for more precise drawing and writing.
When you’re teaching to your kids to write, you are teaching them to think, as writing is a window through which all thinking starts. Our task, regarding creativity, is to help our little ones climb their own mountains, as high as possible.
Our kids are naturally creative. It is our job to give them the freedom and space to let their creativity blossom to its full potential.
Outdoor play improves your child’s physical, mental, and social development. Physical skills are essential for your child’s growth, physical coordination, and the movement of the body. Outdoor play is a big part of healthy growth, development, and learning of your child. When children play outdoors, they increase their ability to jump, climb, throw, run, and balance themselves.
Outdoor play helps your baby to learn about different surroundings and can make you feel more comfortable with the world around him. Enjoy some time on a blanket or towel with your little champ, crawling on the grass, through big boxes, under outdoor furniture, looking at different colored cars, street signs, and traffic light signals. Enjoying some beautiful moments with him, you can help your child make the most of this stage with outdoor plays.
Playing outside helps your child to develop his learning abilities. By putting some educational materials outdoors, your child is soon learning through play, which is a fun way and also helps your child to develop new skills of information and abilities.
With more room to play in, your child is often more active when outside. It helps them to build functional fitness, strong bones, and also enable them to burn off extra energy and calories.
Outdoor plays help your child to come out of his shells and to be more socially prepared. It means that your child will be more willing to join in games and activities; he will also be more likely to talk to other children and make new friends. Theseactivities encourage your child to learn social skills and how yo interact with others.
While playing outside and interacting with other children, help your child to learn independence when socially interacting with other children as well as learning to play himself.
Your child learns how to takes turns while playing to pick himself up when he falls, all resulting in learning how to be independent and self-reliant.
BUMPS AND BRUISES
It’s OK for your child to push the play boundaries outside, where he has room to run faster, jump further, and climb higher. It might mean some tears and pain, a scrape, or a fall, but these risky activities help your little champ learn from mistakes and bounce back.
Nursery rhymes and songs are very important for our kids as they help to hear the sounds and syllables in words, which helps our kids learn to read! Once our child understands what is being said they find the songs, rhymes, and poems incredibly hilarious!. Emotionally kids relate the rhymes, poems, or songs whatever they had heard to lots of the content!. Contents like being naughty, superheroes, fear of spiders are all close to children’s hearts.
Children are taught songs and poems suitable to their age group. The songs are usually such that have numerous rhyming words, so the children can easily learn them, singing and dancing with the songs, or with the rhymes. Repeating rhymes also helps in the development of our kids.
EFFECTS OF KINDER RYMPIES
When children hear songs or rhymes they are hearing a different range of sounds than they would in normal, everyday speech. Rhymes are powerful tools that can cut through a labyrinth of thoughts, to convey deep meanings in crispy words!
The sing-song, rhymes, and poems introduce your little one to the new ways of using their voice, sometimes making it louder and maybe some times faster or slower. These all improve the child’s vocabulary, cultural knowledge, and realistic.
As your child starts singing songs or rhymes, they subconsciously start making connections with the constituents of words, they start searching for familiar sounds in the rhymes or music and this is often the “first step of your child”.
OPEN DOORS TO HIS NEW WORLD
Songs, rhymes, and poems help your little one to build a better imagination. If you expose your child to poems or rhymes, they are usually also exposed to bright and colorful illustrations. For instance, there is a widely known and loved rhyme that most will remember,
A child, who listens to this rhyme a few times, is listening to a story about stars that are twinkling in the sky, and the child is shocked to see how they do that. The more rhymes your child is exposed to, the more he develops his skills. So, let your child enjoy the goodness of rhymes and poems so that he can fill his imagination world with more beautiful colors, as beautiful as a rainbow!
The prepared environment is the gateway to cater to everything, keeping in view the inner need, since they are hungry for words. Therefore their vocabulary can also be enriched by classified cards. They are also fed with technical terms. Besides this, the child’s personality is groomed correctly when they are given attention at the right time and the right age, only by talking and listening properly to the child in the prepared environment. It must be bright, inviting, warm, and beautiful as it is placed where they can do things for themselves, live their own life without any immediate help from adults. In doing so, the child becomes conscious of his power and ability to do things himself.
A prepared environment is a special place where children can flourish with freedom and independence. All of this is a vast forest. Inside the forest is the child. This forest is fascinating, green, beautiful, and full of hope, there are no paths inside this forest, the child has to make their paths, as teachers and children are families in the woods. Sometimes they find themselves together within the forest, sometimes they may get lost from each other, but it’s living together in this forest, that is important, and of course, this living is not easy.
The child has full freedom here to move wherever they want; they have the privilege of choice and freedom to interact socially. We believe in giving full independence to our children to choose their daily activities in which they have more interest, and as a mentor, we keep an eye on them and carefully notice and correct them whenever they need help. And this improves their knowledge, learning, and thinking ability.
The child has a high capacity to retain and reproduce words. He takes in much more than he shows. The prepared environment should support social development by encouraging freedom of interaction. Living in a good social environment increases the likelihood through which a child will develop a positive social relationship.
The more your child interacts with his mentors, the more it will boost their self-confidence and self-esteem. Spending time in play and conversation with other kids allows your children to learn about emotions and relationships. They watch everything and notice how to interact with others and how to react in different situations.
The intellectual environment helps the child in the prepared environment to develop their understanding, reasoning, learning, memorizing skills, and many more. As loving and caring mentors, we incorporate best practices to nurture and pamper our kids. From the early stage of their life, we focus on their physical, emotional, and intellectual development, as they all together develop the whole personality of the child.


“What you need to know in order to write a story is not what I need to know in order to read it.”Ralph Hale
The other day an editing client asked, “How should I handle exposition?” Is it better, he wondered, to put it in dialogue? In the character’s thoughts? Or just have the narrator tell it?
There’s a tendency among many writers, myself included, to explain too much, and I’ve become ruthless about weeding out as much exposition as possible. So my gut reaction to the client’s question was, “None of the above. Get rid of it.”
But this client is writing a story with an epic fantasy setting. How can the reader enter the world he’s built—a world complete with non-human characters, its own social structures, and a long history—unless the narrator explains some of it? Simply deleting every explanation isn’t a sound editorial strategy.
In this article we’ll consider what exposition is. We’ll see why we can’t get rid of it altogether, and we’ll learn how brain science can help us understand when to use it and why. At the end, we’ll be a big step closer to writing novels that glide along on story-rails with the least possible friction.
What exactly is exposition?
“Exposition is a literary device used to introduce background information about events, settings, characters, or other elements of a work to the audience or readers. The word comes from the Latin language, and its literal meaning is ‘a showing forth.’ Exposition is crucial to any story, for without it nothing makes sense.” —Literary Devices.net
“Exposition means facts—the information about setting, biography, and characterization that the audience needs to know to follow and comprehend the events of the story.” —Robert McKee, Story (p. 334).
McKee goes on to extol the famous writers’ axiom “Show, don’t tell,” and he devotes an entire chapter to the craft of disguising exposition.
So which is it? Is exposition necessary? Or is it so undesirable that it needs to be disguised?
It’s both. Trouble is, the “Show Don’t Tell” evangelists never explain why we have to hide our exposition. They just vaguely imply that exposition is somehow against the rules because it’s “boring.”
As explanations go, that’s pretty weak. After all, you’ve found a way to put your visions and inventions on the page, often in carefully-crafted prose. It’s not boring to you. You’re going to need a more convincing reason than “it’s boring” before you’re ready to remove it.
Exposition and brainwork
To understand why exposition is a such a challenge in fiction, let’s have a little brain science.
Steven Pinker, in The Sense of Style, tells us that human working memory can hold only four or five items at a time. This is a severe mental limitation, but we work around it with a process called “chunking.”
Chunking is when we group ideas so that together they occupy only one of the four or five available memory slots in our brain. Pinker gives this example:
M D P H D R S V P C E O I H O P
It looks random and meaningless, doesn’t it? It would take a fair amount of brain energy to force even a few of those 16 letters into your memory.
But if you group the letters as MD PHD RSVP CEO and IHOP, you now have five chunks, each containing meaning—effectively five recognizable “words.” The amount of brain energy it took you to absorb that string dropped dramatically.
And if you can package those five chunks into a coherent story, you create a single larger chunk that occupies only one memory slot, leaving the other three or four open for other stories.
“The MD and the PhD RSVP’d to the CEO of IHOP.”
Read that once—ideally aloud—and chances are that you can remember it and repeat it. (Of course there’s some cultural context here. IHOP, for those outside North America, is the International House of Pancakes, a restaurant chain.)
What does this tidbit of brain science have to do with exposition? Simply this: exposition in a story is analogous to M D P H D R S V P C E O I H O P. It’s new, un-chunked information, and taking it in requires masses of brain processing power.
Exposition, in other words, makes the reader work.
Novelists, especially new novelists, often feel that their exposition is helping the reader do less work because it clarifies the story…explains things…teaches the reader what they need to know in order to keep up with the plot.
The trouble with that belief—and some writers are remarkably insistent on it—is that we don’t open a novel in the hope of exercising our brains. We pick up a novel to be entertained, to enjoy core emotions like excitement, thrills, or risk. We read a story in order to be carried away to strange lands and thrilling adventures, to sigh over true love, weep at misfortune, and forget the trials of our own daily lives.
We read novels to feel, not to think. We read them to relax, not to work. Our personal definitions of reading pleasure may range from the simplest love story to the most complex literary novel, but we still read novels for enjoyment.
We might absorb “The MD and the PhD RSVP’d to the CEO of IHOP,” but it’s still work. We still have to do some translating in our heads.
But present it as “A couple of smart women ate pancakes with a high-powered executive,” and it slides into our consciousness with almost no effort at all. Do we care which woman has which degree? Maybe. Do we need to know? Possibly. Do we need to know it while they’re having breakfast with the head of the restaurant chain? Probably not.
The less brainwork a novel makes us do, the longer we’ll stay up turning pages, enjoying those pancakes along with the highly educated protagonist and her sidekick.
Maybe you’re not writing fluffy pancakes. Maybe you’re more of an eggs-benedict-with-hollandaise writer. Your target reader has chosen your book because it has intellectual cachet, and they’re willing to put more brainpower into reading it. That’s okay. The principles of reading ease can scale. Why make even a very literary novel harder to read than it needs to be?
Two common exposition faults
The two exposition problems I see most often in my clients’ work are:
- Over-reliance on the Big Block of Explanation.
- Acrobatic contortions to avoid the Big Block of Explanation, in adherence to the mighty Show Don’t Tell rule.
Let’s look at each one of them in turn.
The Big Block of Explanation
Here’s a purely made-up example of the Big Block of Explanation:
“Let’s go to the mall,” Heather said.
Imani thought back to the last time she had been to the mall. The terror she had felt at the sound of the first shot fired, the screams of people fleeing for their lives, the crash of displays falling over as customers dove under racks and counters for cover. It had been the worst day of her life.
“I don’t want to go,” Imani replied.
However vivid Imani’s recollection is in that middle paragraph, it does little to reveal her character. It explains some things about Imani, but it’s an info-dump—a Big Block of Explanation.
The block interrupts the action—that is, the dialogue between Heather and Imani—by referring you to a past whose details may or may not be relevant at this point in the story. Here’s what happens in your brain:
- You expend energy time-jumping to Imani’s past.
- You process terror, shots fired, screams, crashes, and people diving under racks. By the time you get to Imani’s response, all your memory slots are engaged, and you’ve lost sight of what Heather said.
- So you expend more brainpower backtracking in the text to remind yourself of Heather’s initial suggestion.
Now, you might be willing to make that effort—to glance up the page and re-read—but if you happen to be an audiobook listener rather than a reader, you’re certainly not going to take the trouble. Either way, the extra brain-fuel you’ve just expended is debited from your attention account, and as that account balance drops, the story will start to feel like work.
I don’t know about you, but when a story starts to feel like work, I put it down.
Contortions to Avoid the Big Block of Explanation
How about the second type of fault, where the writer bends over backward to avoid the Big Block of Explanation? Here’s what I mean:
“Let’s go to the mall,” Heather said.
Imani glared at her. “You know I can’t face going to the mall, Heather.”
“I’m sorry,” Heather said. “I’d forgotten about the time you were there when that gunman shot the place up.”
“That’s right. So I don’t want to go.”
This is what I call the “As You Know, Bob” error. The characters are telling each other things they both already know, in order to inform the reader of something. It’s not only cringingly unnatural, but it commandeers almost as much reader brainpower as the first example. Even if you’re willing to forgive the unnaturalness of the dialogue, you’re forced to pause and process that past event before moving ahead with the present story.
The brainwork framework
Exposition can take a variety of forms, and some of them require more reader brainwork than others. Here are six common ones, from the most brain-intensive to the least:
- Purely explanatory information from the narrator directly to the reader. This is naked exposition. No disguise at all. It serves one purpose: to explain something to the reader. It’s the form that most often evokes a “Show Don’t Tell!” scold from critique partners and beta-readers. This doesn’t mean that you should never use it. It just means that you shouldn’t use it where the reader’s brainpower is already low. More on this later.
- A character’s inner thoughts. Also known as the free indirect style, this is a thin disguise for exposition, best used only when it performs the dual tasks of revealing character while explaining something. We engage emotionally with characters much more easily than we can process an explanation.
- Flashbacks. A lot like character’s inner thoughts, but usually set apart in the text by a scene break. This allows the reader to process the flashback as the fresh beginning of a new story—that is, by freeing up memory slots. Note, though, that it’s hard work keeping track of the complex timelines flashbacks create.
- Descriptive passages. These take take less brainwork to process than abstract explanations, because most readers already have a ready sensory vocabulary of colors, shapes, sounds, smells, etc. Similarly, they can call up images of clouds, mountains, trees, buildings, streets, and so forth, without working very hard.
- Dialogue. Dialogue is technically action (the characters are doing something—speaking), so by definition it’s more immediately immersive and less “explainy” than straight exposition. But beware of the “As You Know, Bob” fault if you use dialogue to disguise exposition.
- Letters, diaries, news reports, transcripts, and the like. This is the epistolary narrative device, and it can work in almost any kind of story. Like forms of dialogue, epistolary elements give a sense of immediacy. Reading the newspaper along with a character is much more engaging than being told about the article. The trick is not to cram in a lone epistolary element to solve an exposition problem. It should be one of several, a narrative device that runs throughout your story.
Exposition and narrative drive
Exposition is sometimes necessary, but it’s amazing how often it’s not. Here’s our little Imani and Heather scene without it:
“Let’s go to the mall,” Heather said.
Imani glared at her. “Are you kidding me?”
“Okay, okay. Never mind.”
This version leverages that magical thing called narrative drive. Narrative drive is what keeps a reader reading. The specific form of narrative drive here is mystery. That’s when the character knows more than the reader.
In this version, Imani knows why she doesn’t want to go to the mall, but you don’t. All you know is that for some reason, she’s opposed to it. From her glare and her choice of words, she seems afraid or angry. Something bad lies behind that. What could the problem be?
Heather might know about it, but either she’s forgotten or doesn’t care. Is she so self-centered? Or was it really not that big a deal?
Yes, these are questions. It’s questions, not answers, that create narrative drive. You keep reading until you find answers, and ideally you don’t get the last answer till the very end of the story.
(NB: Everything you need to know about narrative drive, Valerie Francis has brilliantly set forth in her articles on the subject. Links are at the end of this post.)
The Pandora Effect
Why do questions create the narrative drive that keeps us reading?
In Greek mythology, Pandora is consumed by curiosity when someone gives her a closed box and tells her never to open it. She opens it. Bad things fly out.
If you had the box, would you open it? “The Pandora Effect” is the name researchers have given to the experimental finding that yes, you probably would. Why? Because human beings are curious.
Curiosity is one of the most fundamental traits of human existence. It’s the desire to close a gap in our knowledge. It drives us to explore, to invent, to solve problems in new ways. Without it, we’d still be living in caves. To bypass our powerful instinct for safety and survival, the curiosity instinct—which courts danger—must be at least as powerful.
And it is. The Pandora Effect is our counterintuitive tendency to risk danger in order to find out what’s in the box.
Raising questions in your story and leaving them unanswered for a while is like handing your reader that box. They will be eager to open it.
Where does exposition belong?
Well-written exposition can be engaging in its own right. Plenty of great classic novels are heavy on exposition—particularly those from the eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries. Long passages of exposition can be interesting, charming, and stylish, and people still read those novels today.
But there’s a limit. No novel was ever more sprawlingly explainy than Moby Dick. Herman Melville knew everything about whaling, and by George he wants the reader to learn it too. That’s why modern readers can’t get through Moby Dick.
We are twenty-first century century readers. The most dedicated and enthusiastic of us have consumed a lifetime of stories via movies and television alongside our reading, and we don’t want a lot of explanations.
This isn’t just because attention spans have shrunk to the vanishing point (though that’s certainly a consideration). And it’s not solely because exposition requires brainwork.
It’s also because we’ve become far more sophisticated at consuming stories than our eighteenth- and nineteenth-century ancestors were. We’ve been trained to process stories faster, to take in small cues quickly. Unlike our great-grandparents, we don’t need the camera to linger on a clue for us to spot it, and we don’t need a narrator to explain our characters’ every action or utterance in detail. We get it, already.
Are you beginning to feel that this supposedly “necessary” thing called exposition doesn’t belong anywhere?
Almost but not quite true. Blocks of explanatory material have very little place in a modern novel, but they aren’t completely disallowed. The most likely place in any story for some straight up exposition is at the beginning.
“Once upon a time, there were three bears…” or “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…” or “It began with the forging of the great rings…”
The reader’s brain is fresh at the beginning. Its memory slots are free. At that point, it can handle a little learning, a little instruction, a little scene-setting or world-building.
A little. Not pages and pages.
“At the beginning” isn’t limited to just the global opening. It can mean the start of an act or sequence; it can be when the story moves to a new setting, or introduces a new character. It can even be at the start of a new chapter. (Just don’t start every chapter with a block of explanation. I address the various ways to launch a scene in my article How To Launch a Scene.)
The worst place for exposition of any sort is in the middle of the action—including in the middle of dialogue. Putting a block of explanation there is like popping up in front of the movie screen to tell the audience what you know. Consciously or unconsciously, the reader wants you to sit down, shut up, let them enjoy the show.
So you still have some blocks of exposition…
…and you’re convinced that you can’t get rid of them. What do you do?
First, confirm that the information in each block of exposition genuinely serves the story. Does it turn a scene? Expose a character’s wants and needs? Reflect your story’s controlling idea? It is crucial to one of the obligatory scenes or conventions of your genre? Can the story work without it?
No matter how interesting and creative it is, no matter how much trouble you took to research and write it, if the story can work without it, it’s a candidate for the chopping block.
If it does serve the story, note the key story information it contains. In our Imani and Heather example above, that would be “Imani was present during a shooting” and maybe “Imani is traumatized.”
Then think through your story. What would happen if you put that information prior to her conversation with Heather? If the reader knows in advance that Imani was traumatized at the mall, then the mystery raised by that conversation will be lost.
But you gain a different form of narrative drive: dramatic irony. We know something that Heather doesn’t know. We shake our heads and think, “Oh, Heather, what a careless suggestion! You’re going to feel so bad when you find out.”
What would happen if you inserted the information later? Then the mystery raised by the conversation with Heather remains. Where best to solve that mystery (by revealing the information about Imani’s trauma) will depend on how pivotal a character Imani is, and how her trauma affects the story.
But if Imani’s trauma at the mall has no bearing on the story, remember: she’s a character, not a real person. You can remove that trauma as easily as you inflicted it.
Some final brainwork numbers
Say you’ve spent two and a half hours a day, five days a week for two years writing, editing, and polishing your novel of 100,000 words.
That’s 1300 hours of work.
The average reader can absorb fiction at about 250 words per minute—faster, if you’ve given them a real page-turner—so they will spend six or seven hours reading your novel.
This means that you spend 200 times more effort creating your novel than the reader will spend reading it.
And that’s exactly as it should be. If the ratio were any lower, it would mean that you’ve slowed the reader down with hard-to-process sentences. Obstacles. Friction.
And I hope it’s clear by now that a major source of friction in fiction is exposition.
Our love of our own creation tempts us all to leave details on the page that don’t drive the story forward. Some readers might forgive it, but if they leave reviews, they’ll include phrases like “takes a little getting into” or “rewards your patience.”
Many will give up, and if those readers leave reviews at all, they will say damning things like “did not finish,” “tedious,” or “hard to follow,” even though they won’t be able to say exactly why.
Here’s a tip: Nobody—not even the tolerant reader who loves nineteenth century novels—will ever complain because your story was a smooth joyride to read.
As the author, you’re the world-builder, the omnipotent deity of the universe of your novel. You need to have done all the research, character development, mapping, and timelines. You have to know all about the geography of your world, the backstories of its people, the socioeconomic system in which they live. You have to know the wants and needs, the trials and the triumphs, that have brought your characters into this story.
You have to do all the brainwork so that the reader has to do hardly any.
Then you need to tell a story.
Valerie Francis on Narrative Drive:
I’m indebted to Rachelle Ramirez for editing this article and suggesting the eggs benedict.
If you’re a writer looking for editorial help with your novel, you can learn more about my editing services at annehawley.net


1 GEOGRAPHIC SETTING AND ENVIRONMENT
Haiti occupies the western third of the island of Hispaniola (the
Dominican Republic occupies the eastern two thirds). Haiti is slightly
larger than the state of Maryland, with an area of 27,750 square
kilometers (10,714 square miles) including several islands. Three main
mountain ranges, separated by open plains, stretch across the country. The
climate is tropical, with some variation depending on altitude. Coffee,
cocoa, coconuts, avocado, orange, lime, and mango grow wild. The most
important commercial crops are coffee and sugarcane. Other important crops
include bananas, corn, rice, sorghum, beans, and cocoa beans. The virgin
forests that once covered the entire country have now been reduced to
about 4 percent of the total land area.
2 HISTORY AND FOOD
Spain, France, the continent of Africa, and later the United States, were
crucial in shaping traditional Haitian cuisine. Throughout its history,
several foreign countries gained control of Haiti, introducing food and
ideas from their native lands, many of which significantly affected the
foods modern Haitians eat.
The island of Hispaniola, which encompasses both Haiti and the Dominican
Republic, was inhabited by hunter-gatherers as early as 5000 B.C. Fruits
and vegetables such as guavas, pineapples, cassava, papayas, sweet
potatoes, and corn were cultivated by early Haitian tribes, particularly
the Arawak and Taino Indians. It was not long before the first European
arrived on the island and began introducing oranges, limes, mangoes, rice,
and sugarcane. Slaves from Africa were eventually transported to Haiti to
work the sugarcane plantations.
On December 6, 1492, Christopher Columbus landed on the island and named
La Isla Espanola
(later named Hispaniola), or the Spanish Island, and claimed it for
Spain. The Spaniards called it Santo Domingo. The Spanish established
sugar plantations and made the native Indians work as slaves. Hard labor
and disease nearly wiped out the indigenous population by 1520, forcing
the Spaniards to ship slaves from Africa to work the plantations instead.
The Africans introduced okra (also called gumbo; edible pods),
(red and yellow fruit),
(edible root), pigeon peas (seeds of an African shrub), and various
spices to the diet. They later introduced such Haitian specialties as red
beans and rice and
; a pear-shaped vegetable) to Louisiana's Creole cuisine.
By 1700, the French had taken control of Hispaniola from Spain. The French
colonists successfully cultivated sugarcane, coffee, cotton, and cocoa
with the help of African slaves.
Haitians won their independence and became the first African-American
republic in the New World in 1804. French rule, however, remains evident
in modern Haitian society, particularly in the wide use of the French
language, and in the contributions to the country's cuisine. French
cheeses, desserts, and breads are commonly found at local markets and
French-Style Lettuce Salad
- 1 head lettuce
- 1 garlic clove, sliced
- 2 Tablespoons salad oil
- 1 Tablespoon wine vinegar
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- Pepper, to taste
- 1 Tablespoon parsley, minced
- 1 teaspoon lime juice
- Wash, drain, and thoroughly dry the lettuce.
- Rub a salad bowl with garlic and add the other ingredients to the bowl.
- Mix well.
- Tear lettuce leaves into bowl.
- Just before serving, toss thoroughly.
Serves 4 to 6.
- 1 Tablespoon cornstarch
- 1 Tablespoon flour
- 1 Tablespoon sugar
- 1 can creamed corn
- 2 eggs, beaten
- ½ cup milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 3 Tablespoons butter, melted
- Preheat oven to 325°F.
- Combine cornstarch, flour, sugar, and salt in a saucepan.
- Stir in creamed corn and beaten eggs.
- Add the milk, vanilla and butter.
- Mix well and pour into a shallow casserole dish and bake for about 1
Serves 2 to 4.
- 3 egg whites
- ¾ cup cocoa
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 4 to 8 Tablespoons sugar, to taste
- 1 cup cold milk
- 11 cups milk
Corn pudding may be served warm from the oven or at room
- Mix egg whites, cocoa, cinnamon, and sugar into a paste.
- Dilute the paste with 1 cup of cold milk.
- Boil the remaining 11 cups of milk over low heat.
- Gradually add the paste to the boiling milk, beating constantly.
- Serve hot and foamy.
- 4 cups water
- 3 cups orange juice
- 2 mangoes
- 1 cup sugar
- Boil the sugar and water together until sugar is dissolved; let mixture
- Scoop out the mango flesh and combine with orange juice in a blender.
- Add the sugar water with puree and continue to blend.
- Pour into a pitcher filled with ice cubes and serve.
3 FOODS OF THE HAITIANS
Haitian food is often lumped together with other Caribbean islands as
"Caribbean cuisine." However, Haiti maintains an
independently unique flavor. Unlike its Spanish-influenced counterpart,
the Dominican Republic, Haitian cuisine is based on Creole and French
cooking styles. Strong pepper flavoring in many dishes also sets Haitian
food apart from the other islands.
Several dishes are specifically native to Haiti, including rice
(jon-JON). It requires Haitian black mushrooms, locally grown fungi. The
stems of the mushrooms are used to color the rice black, then the mushroom
caps with lima beans are used as a tasty topping.
(kah-lah-LOO), consisting of crabmeat, salted pork, spinach, onion, okra,
and peppers, and
(pane pah-TAT), a sweetened potato, fig, and banana pudding, are other
native dishes to Haiti.
(pumpkin soup) is traditionally served for lunch on Sundays.
In general, the average Haitian diet is largely based on starch staples
such as rice (which is locally grown), corn, millet, yams, and beans.
However, wealthier residents can afford meats (usually pork and goat),
lobster, spiced shrimp, duck, and sweet desserts such as French-influenced
mousse and pastries.
Extravagant fare such as frog legs, cold cuts, and French cheeses are
available (typically in Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital), but they
are not commonly eaten by the average Haitian.
Riz et Pois
, the country's national dish of rice and beans, is more common
fare. It is relatively inexpensive, and the rice and beans provide
carbohydrates for field workers.
(cornmeal mush) cooked with kidney beans, coconut, and peppers, and
(spicy pickled carrots and cabbage) can be filling, and its ingredients
are usually affordable. Haitians also tend to frequently fry their meals
in pig fat to give them greater flavor.
(fried plantains, similar to bananas),
(deep-fried beef), and
(fried pork) are common examples.
Haiti's tropical Caribbean climate allows for tropical fruits such
as avocados, mangoes, pineapples, coconuts, and guava to grow in
abundance. Such fruits are often used to make refreshing fruit juices.
Other popular beverages include shaved ice topped with a fruity syrup,
(a locally produced orange squash drink), and even sugarcane. Both adults
and children enjoy chewing on the stalks to extract its sweet juice.
Use a flat spatula or the bottom of a drinking glass to flatten the
fried plantain slices to make Bannann Peze.
Bannann Peze (Fried Plantains)
- ½ cup vegetable oil
- 2 medium-sized green plantains, peeled and sliced
- In a heavy 12-inch skillet, heat the oil over moderate heat.
- Add as many plantain slices as you can without crowding the pan and
brown for about 2 minutes on each side.
- As they brown, transfer them to paper towels to drain.
- On a board, using a spatula, press each slice flat and round, about
¼-inch thick and 2 inches in diameter.
- Heat the oil and fry the rounds again for about 1 minute on each side.
- Drain on paper towels and serve immediately.
- Serves 4.
Riz et Pois Rouges (Rice and Red Beans)
- 1 medium onion, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 medium green bell pepper, chopped
- 2 Tablespoons vegetable oil
- 1 cup rice, uncooked
- 2 cans (15 ounces each) kidney beans, drained
- ¼ pound ham, chopped
- ½ teaspoon cumin
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon oregano
- ¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper
- 2½ cups boiling water
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
- Heat oil in a large skillet.
- Cook and stir the onion, garlic, and green pepper until tender, about 3
- In a separate bowl, combine and mix all the remaining ingredients.
- Add the onion mixture to the bowl and stir well.
- Pour entire mixture into an ungreased 2-quart casserole dish.
- Cover and bake until liquid is absorbed and rice is tender, about 55
- Stir before serving.
Makes 5 to 6 servings.
Riz Djon-Djon (Rice and Haitian Mushrooms)
- 2 cups long grain rice
- 1 cup Haitian black mushrooms (or dried, black European mushrooms)
- 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
- 4 Tablespoons butter
- Salt, pepper, and thyme, to taste
- Remove the stems from the mushrooms and soak them in a cup of hot water
for 30 minutes.
- Soak the heads in a separate cup of hot water.
- Sauté the rice and garlic in butter, then add all the other
ingredients, including the water used to soak the mushrooms (discard the
mushroom stems, which are inedible).
- Cook for 20 minutes and serve.
Haitian Fruit Salad
- 2 oranges, peeled and sectioned
- 3 bananas, sliced
- ½ cup melon balls
- ½ cup strawberries, sliced
- 4 slices pineapple, diced
- ½ cup raspberries
- ¼ cup roasted peanuts
- ¼ cup pineapple juice
- ¼ cup lime juice
- 1 cup sweetened condensed milk
- Shredded coconut (optional)
- In a large bowl, combine oranges, bananas, melon balls, strawberries,
pineapple, raspberries, and nuts.
- In a separate bowl, combine the pineapple juice, lime juice, condensed
milk, and beaten eggs.
- Pour the juice mixture on top of the fruit.
- Top with shredded coconut.
4 FOOD FOR RELIGIOUS AND HOLIDAY CELEBRATIONS
Religion is an important part of Haitian life and culture. The two main
religions are Roman Catholicism and Voudou (or Voodoo), a mixture of
African animism (belief in spirits and nature) and Christianity. In
addition to visiting family and enjoying delicious meals together,
religious and secular (nonreligious) celebrations are also a time to
forget about everyday poverty and hardship.
Roman Catholics observe such holidays as Good Friday, Easter Sunday, and
Christmas—one of the most celebrated of all Christian holidays
worldwide. On Christmas Eve in Haiti, Roman Catholics attend midnight
mass, followed by a celebration dinner and gift exchanges. Children will
also travel through local streets carrying a small house or church that
they have made ahead of time with strips of cardboard called a
(fah-NAHL). Typically, only the homes of the wealthy will own a Christmas
tree, but everyone in a village might get to enjoy
Haitians who practice voudou enjoy harvest festivals that take place for
two days each November. Haitian peasants observe
(mahn-djay YAM), literally meaning "eat yam" day. Along
with singing and dancing, the festival is celebrated by feasting and
drinking. The purpose of this day is to recognize the importance of the
yam in the rural Haitian diet.
National holidays, holidays observed and celebrated by the majority of the
population (regardless of religious beliefs), are also popular. November 2
is All Souls' Day (or the Day of the Dead). On this special day,
loved ones who have passed away are honored and their lives celebrated
through storytelling, eating, and drinking. Many people choose to place
food in front of a loved one's grave or on the table where they
used to eat. Only after the food has been offered will the rest of the
family enjoy their own meals.
A Typical Christmas Menu
Fried pork or goat
(spicy pickled carrots and cabbage)
(sweetened potato, fig, and banana pudding)
Probably the most widely celebrated event in Haiti is known as Carnival,
or Mardi Gras. Though the main attraction is music, these three days
Wednesday each February (known as "Fat Tuesday" in the
United States) are also marked by days of celebratory feasting.
Pain Haïtien (Haitian Bread)
- 2 packages active dry yeast
- 1½ cups warm water
- ¼ cup honey
- 2 Tablespoons vegetable oil
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ¾ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 4 cups flour
- ¼ teaspoon instant coffee
- 2 Tablespoons milk
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
- Dissolve the yeast in a large bowl in warm water.
- Stir in honey, oil, salt, nutmeg, and 2 cups of the flour.
- Beat until very smooth, about 1 minute.
- Gradually add enough of the remaining flour to make a stiff dough.
- Turn dough onto a lightly floured surface; knead until smooth, about 5
- Place in a greased bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm place until about
double in size, about 50 minutes. Punch down on dough.
- Press in greased jelly roll plan (about 15x10x1-inch).
- Cut dough into about 2½-inch squares with a sharp knife, cutting
two-thirds of the way through the dough.
- Cover and let rise until double in size, about 30 minutes.
- Dissolve the instant coffee in the milk and brush over the dough.
- Bake until the bread is golden brown, about 35 minutes.
- Break the bread into squares to serve.
Makes 2 dozen squares.
- 1 can pineapple, crushed
- ⅛ teaspoon nutmeg, plus additional for topping
- ½ cup coconut milk
- 1 cup milk
- Combine all the ingredients in a blender and mix well.
- Top the drink with additional nutmeg.
Serves 4 to 6.
5 MEALTIME CUSTOMS
Most of Haitian society consists of peasants who live a simple lifestyle.
On a small plot of owned or rented land, the peasants usually cultivate
beans, sweet potatoes, maize (similar to corn), bananas, or coffee (and
sometimes a combination). Men plant and harvest the crops while the women
typically take care of the children, prepare meals, and sell the extra
crops they have grown (if there are any) at the local market.
Markets are frequently the center of economic and social activity in small
Haitian villages, and a place where mostly women can be seen selling
produce. Markets located in tourist areas, such as Port-au-Prince,
the country's capital, often open for business as early as 5 A.M.
It is normal for women to sometimes walk several miles each way to the
market carrying large baskets of produce on their heads. Though vegetables
and fruits are probably the most commonly sold food, salted codfish, and
various meats, and manioc flour are also popular. There are no
refrigerators, so seafood and meat is typically covered in salt to help
preserve it in the warm, outdoor markets. Other homemade products such as
clothing, cooking utensils, and baskets are also sold.
Ready-to-eat meals are also available, usually for the hungry tourist. The
most popularly sold dish is a porridge made of a ground corn, sugar, and
milk, cooked over a large fire. It is usually eaten immediately after it
has been purchased, typically served in a tin cup.
Peasants themselves usually begin the day with a light breakfast of
locally grown coffee and bread made of manioc flour (wheat flour is often
too expensive for the typical Haitian peasant, who has very little money).
Most peasants work in the fields and take a break for a light snack around
midday. Another break from fieldwork (as well as a chance to see his
family) is in the late afternoon when peasants often return home to eat
the main meal of the day. Unfortunately, the main meal of the day may be
little more than what was eaten for the midday snack—porridge and
possibly a freshly grown fruit, such as pineapple, coconut, or mango.
Haiti's national dish of beans and rice may also be eaten. Pumpkin
soup is traditionally eaten for lunch on Sundays, for those who can afford
its ingredients (it is also eaten on New Year's Day for good luck).
Spicy, flavorful sauces are common in several Haitian dishes, particularly
to season bland peasant dishes. The most popular sauce is
(tih-mah-LISS), a very spicy tomato and onion mixture.
Ti-Malice (Spicy Haitian Sauce)
- 10 large tomatoes, peeled and quartered
- 3 white onions, quartered
- 4 red hot peppers (jalapeños work well), seeded
- 3 Tablespoons brown sugar
- 1 Tablespoon salt
- 2 cups malt vinegar
- Purée the tomatoes, onions, and peppers in a food processor.
- Transfer to a large saucepan and add the brown sugar, salt, and malt
- Stir well to combine.
- Cook the sauce over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until it begins
- Lower the heat and simmer for 20 minutes, continuing to stir
- Serve with any Haitian rice or meat dish.
- 6 cups water
- 1 teaspoon salt (optional)
- 2 cups cornmeal
- 2 Tablespoons butter, margarine, canola oil, or olive oil
- Bring water to boil in a large pot. Add the salt, if desired.
- Gradually stir in cornmeal with a whisk. Turn heat down to medium.
- Stir briskly to get the lumps out, then cook for another 10 to 20
minutes, stirring frequently (add water if it becomes too thick).
- Remove from heat and stir in butter or oil.
- Serve immediately or pour into a square pan.
- Let cool and cut into squares.
Serves 4 to 6.
6 POLITICS, ECONOMICS, AND NUTRITION
About 61 percent of the population of Haiti is classified as
undernourished by the World Bank. This means they do not receive adequate
nutrition in their diet. Of children under the age of five, about 28
percent are underweight, and nearly one-third are stunted (short for their
Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, with unemployment
rates as high as 70 percent of the population. Many families cannot afford
healthy, vitamin-enriched meals, although mangoes are frequently eaten to
avoid a Vitamin A deficiency. In addition, only about one-quarter of
Haitians have access to adequate sanitation.
Although the country is surrounded by an abundance of water, it continues
to lack water in both quantity and quality. Poor nutrition and sanitation
have caused Haiti to have one of the youngest life expectancies. In 1998,
the average life expectancy was 54.4 years of age.
7 FURTHER STUDY
Haiti: Cultures of the World
. Tarrytown, NY: Marshall Cavendish Corporation, 1995.
(accessed April 16, 2001).
Culinary Specialties of Haiti. [Online] Available
(accessed April 16, 2001).
Recipe Goldmine. [Online] Available
(accessed April 16, 2001).


DRIVING CHANGE IN THE WORLD
Projects, Multiple Viewpoints and Enacting Positive Change
Our project based approach to teaching and learning frames projects on interdisciplinary, meaningful, and current real world problems. Students have the opportunity to explore current issues by speaking with a diverse range of experts and consulting sources that articulate a variety of viewpoints. Students explore media literacy and critical thinking as they evaluate and make sense of divergent perspectives on the specific issues they choose to dive deeper into, while connecting these issues to curricular content and skills. Speaking with experts and communities impacted by these issues allows them to generate a more nuanced understanding of content, with empathy. By investigating the larger context of the issues they are exploring, students engage in a design process to iterate, prototype and test possible solutions, towards doing or producing positive change. With constant feedback from peers, teachers and experts, students revise, reflect and tell the story of their learning journey, failures, successes and major discoveries.
Making a Positive Impact in the World
In the fall of 2016, the senior class of Tahoe Expedition Academy was asked to design a class service trip on their own. As a crew, they decided that with the turmoil in the Middle East and the refugee crisis in Europe, they would travel to Greece to volunteer with PRAKSIS, a non governmental organization that provides social and medical services for refugees. The goal of the trip was to understand and help refugees forced to flee their own country to find safety elsewhere.
At the culmination their Learning Expedition titled “Move, Adapt, or Die: The Life and Times of a Syrian Refugee,” students produced this short documentary film, which illustrates the challenges of current Syrian refugees in Greece. They also created a Facebook page to spread awareness of the plight of refugees in Greece and to support the PRAKSIS aid organization and all of the volunteers they met along the way. If you are interested in supporting PRAKSIS, their donation portal is here with details on how your support would be used.
HIGH SCHOOL ACADEMIC PROGRAMMING - FOUNDATIONS COURSES
These classes are directly aligned with National Standards for the core content areas (Math, Science, History, English). These classes include individually-paced opportunities as well as one-on-one and small group instruction. Teachers target specific skills within these classes to support Real-World Projects through foundational class content.
9th and 10th-Grade Foundation Courses
9th grade foundation courses: Biology, Integrated Math I (students will be placed into a math class based on their previous math course), Social Studies - Human Geography, English and Language Arts, Spanish I, II, III, IV. 10th grade foundation courses: Chemistry or Physics (depending on math level), Integrated Math II (students will be placed into a math class based on their previous math course) Social Studies - Modern World History, English & Language Arts, Spanish I, II, III, IV.
11th and 12th-Grade Foundation Courses
11th-grade foundation courses: Physics or Earth Science (depending on math level), Integrated Math III (students will be placed into a math class based on their previous math course), Social Studies - U.S. History, English and Language Arts, Spanish I, II, III, IV. 12th grade courses: Earth Science or Chemistry (depending on math level), Calculus or Statistics (students will be placed into a math class based on their previous math course), Social Studies - U.S. Government, English and Language Arts, Spanish I, II, III, IV.
These courses are an essential component of both student choice and academic support. Intensives are courses lasting from five to eight days in which students are engaged in either an in-depth study of a topic or intensive academic support. They are offered at the end of the fall semester so that students failing one or more courses have the opportunity and support to complete their work. Students passing all courses choose from a menu of multi-grade level intensives.
Semester-long, interdisciplinary curricula that use a topical lens and specific case studies to explore content in depth and engage with real-world learning, problem solving and skills development.
Individual Senior Projects
In the spring, students in 12th-grade create and pursue their own integrated course of study during the last semester of their senior year called the Individual Senior Intensive, which tackles a real world problem. This long-term academic endeavor can involve language acquisition and volunteerism or other opportunities within respectable and faculty-approved boundaries and is intended to provide students with an opportunity to demonstrate what they are capable of doing and producing to have a positive impact on their lives and the world.
Field Studies, Experts and Service
Real World Projects embed and integrate field studies, experts and service learning into a larger curriculum unit. Beyond the classroom walls, students engage in acts of service, locally, nationally and globally. During field studies, they collaborate with local organizations, engage with relevant experts and contribute to their community through entrepreneurship and volunteerism. By giving and intentionally directing their efforts, intellect and resources to where it can benefit the greater good, students become active citizens in their communities. Advisors and teachers guide students through this process during their school career, which culminates with a Senior Project.
MEET OUR AMAZING HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS
Our faculty and staff empower students to question, think, explore and lead. Relationships between our students and teachers are paramount to creating a community of care, service, and commitment. To learn more about our faculty and staff please click below.
Beth Valarino | Middle and High School Humanities Coach + Crew Leader
Beth was born and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii. After she graduated from high school, she attended a small college in New Hampshire for a year and a half before moving back to Hawaii to finish her undergraduate degree. During her college years she participated in four separate study abroad programs that took her all over the world. She studied French and Environmental Science in Tahiti, sailed around the Marquesas Islands learning through a lens of Pacific Archaeology, and sailed around the world two times while taking college classes through a program called Semester at Sea.
After she graduated from college, her life and teaching career took her on a journey teaching and living abroad. After spending ten years teaching at private international schools in Central America and in the Middle East, she returned to the United States where she taught at a college preparatory school in the Pacific Northwest before moving to the Reno/Tahoe area.
Beth is excited to embark on her fourth year teaching at TEA, and her 15th year teaching. Her passion for life and love for adventure resonates through the experiences and opportunities she provides for her students. In Cairo, Egypt, she spent four years facilitating an outdoor education program in addition to classroom teaching. She organized sandboarding trips to the Fayoum desert, windsurfing trips to the Red Sea, horseback riding to the pyramids, and trips into lesser known Oases outside of Cairo’s city sprawl. One of the highlights of her teaching life was returning to Cairo in June 2018 to surprise her former students at their High School graduation!
Some of Beth’s personal interests include reading, writing, surfing, stand up paddling, cycling, mountain biking, hiking, running, snowboarding, traveling, floating rivers, and spending time with her golden retriever and wife. She’s been to over 50 countries, ran two half marathons, and has summited Mount Kilimanjaro, Mount Kenya, and Mount Meru.
What inspired you to join TEA? Working at TEA has inspired a daily practice of gratitude and self-reflection. It’s helped me to look at mistakes or missteps as areas for growth, rather than areas of being small. It’s helped me to ask myself “What can I learn from this? How can I grow? What more can know or learn in order to be successful next time?”
Where did you go to school? Chaminade University, BA in English, MAT, and MEd in Education and Teaching
Do you have any special certifications? WFA Certified
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I love car camping, and we have a glamping set up that could rival a stay at the penthouse suite at The Four Seasons!
Matt Morrison | Dean of Students + Middle and High School Humanities Coach + Crew Leader
Matt’s passion for teaching came from his time as a snow board instructor at Northstar. Though he enjoyed instructing adults, it was the kid groups that truly made him smile. Life had other plans though, and Matt put his ideas of teaching on hold while working in the private yacht industry, plying the waters of the South Pacific during the winters and cruising around New Zealand during the summers. He ended up going back to school to get his teaching degree in New Zealand and worked in a local elementary school as a 4th/5th grade teacher for 2 years before moving back to the USA. Once back home in 2012, Matt joined TEA where he taught 5th grade for 6 years before making the transition to the Middle School and High School in 2018. Matt was thrilled to join the Middle and High School team and have the opportunity to focus in on his love of history, while also helping to solidify the Middle School as an integral part of TEA.
What inspired you to join TEA? Seeing my kiddos come home from school each day with smiles on their faces and stories to tell.
Where did you go to school? University of Waikato / Graduate Diploma in Teaching; Sierra Nevada College / BS in Business Administration
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I have logged over 26,000 nautical miles at sea.
Loren Trux | Middle and High School Math & Science Coach + Crew Leader
Loren earned his California Multiple subject Teaching Credential from Chico State University and is currently working toward a Waldorf teaching certificate. During his most recent teaching experiences in Waldorf education he discovered many alternative methods for reading instruction and teaching techniques. Loren discovered his passion for working with children at a day camp in Tahoe City more than fifteen years ago and is very excited to be doing what he loves in Tahoe once again. He is eager to learn more about the expeditionary model and looks forward to sharing his ideas with the communiTEA.
He also enjoys many outdoor activities including mountain biking, kayaking, fishing and exploring nature with his family. Loren likes to play music and work making things with his hands. He lives in Kings Beach with his wife Ashley and daughter Iyla. Loren believes that a teacher’s task is to help each student reach their greatest potential. To do this he must be a guide, and companion in the pursuit of knowledge and the pursuit should be authentic for the student and teacher.
What inspired you to join TEA? The opportunity to help kids reach their greatest potential.
Where did you go to school? California Multiple Subject Teaching Credential from Chico State University
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I am an avid blacksmith and teach a blacksmithing class at TEA’s summer camp.
Natalie Bladis | Middle and High School Math & Science Coach + Crew Leader
Natalie was born in Westchester, New York and grew up on Lake Rippowam in South Salem where her love of the outdoors began. In high school, she took a class called Wilderness which sparked her interest in entering the fields of outdoor and project-based education. She even wrote her college application essay about being a high school math teacher.
After high school, Natalie attended the State University of New York at Geneseo where she studied Mathematics and Secondary Education. The summer after her junior year of college, Natalie hiked the Pacific Crest Trail before teaching abroad in Ghana West Africa during her senior year.
After college, she moved to California to be closer to bigger mountains and teach at a project-based learning school called Da Vinci Charter Academy in Davis. At Da Vinci, Natalie taught Integrated Math 2, Algebra 2/Trigonometry, AP Statistics, and AP Calculus AB. Natalie also founded and coached the Ultimate Frisbee team.
Here in California, she has learned to rock climb and ski. In her spare time, Natalie enjoys yoga and creating ceramic art.
What inspired you to join the TEAm? The most inspiring aspect of TEA for me is the concept of constructive adversity. I seek out constructive adversity in my own life every day to become the best version of myself. One of my personal core values is to face my fears with perseverance and an indomitable spirit. To work at a school that shares this core value inspires me to push myself and help my students set goals that push them every day in the academic setting.
Where did you go to school? SUNY Geneseo, Mathematics and Secondary Education, Minor in Asian Studies (Visual Arts)
Do you have any special certifications? I’m a Yoga Teacher and Ceramic Artist
What’s something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? Even though at heart I am a mountain girl, I love creatures of the sea. I once carried 2 whale vertebrate (each about 3 feet in diameter) 10 miles on the lost coast trail for my collection of sea things by strapping them to my already full pack. I have since traded one of the vertebrae for a moose skull.
Nilo Bill | Middle and High School Math & Science Coach + Crew Leader
Having received his Ph.D. from Oregon State University in geology and climatology after receiving his undergraduate degree from University of Miami, earning a triple major in Geology, Anthropology, and International Studies, Nilo draws from a diverse array of academic disciplines. The pursuit of knowledge has brought Nilo to do fieldwork all over the world, from Antarctica to Alaska. Recently, being named a National Geographic Explorer allowed him to work on solutions to climate change problems in the country of Iceland. This early work of Nilo’s has culminated in several publications in scholarly journals including in Earth and Planetary Science Letters, as well as a coauthor on a high-school level textbook titled The Himalayas: An Encyclopedia of Geography, History, and Culture. If you walk into Nilo’s classroom you will likely find students engaged in hypothesis driven science or discussions surrounding scientific epistemology, or, how scientists know what they know. Nilo believes that an eye toward his students’ future is important while maintaining a healthy dose of fun and adrenaline along the way. To Nilo, no matter where he is in the field with his students there is an outdoor lesson in natural science waiting to be unleashed. The real world provides the most interesting and useful problems to solve, and that is where Nilo’s classes always begin. If he is not talking about science with his students, Nilo is likely comparing notes with students on ski conditions, best Tahoe ski runs and plans of attack for upcoming powder days.
What inspired you to join TEA? Creating students that are the best versions of themselves. Being able to not only teach students science and math in ways that excite me, but mentoring them into proto-adulthood.
Where did you go to school? Oregon State University, Ph.D., Geology
Do you have any special certifications? NOLS Wilderness First Responder
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I love bluegrass music and play guitar and banjo.
Michaela Fooksa | Middle and High School Math & Science Coach + Crew Leader
Michaela has been slowing making her way west her whole life. She was born in Boston and received her BA in Mathematics from Colgate University, where she led a math tutoring group at a local high school. She then moved to Nashville, Tennessee to work in a computational biology lab and receive her MS in Chemical and Physical Biology at Vanderbilt University. The next stop was Lake Tahoe, where she fell in love with the unending outdoor activities and the natural beauty and tranquility of the Sierras. Michaela has studied and done research in Math, Physics, Computer Science, Chemistry, and Biology, and she is excited to be able to share her interdisciplinary background as a math and physics teacher. In her free time, Michaela enjoys trail running, backpacking, skiing, swimming, yoga, reading, and country music.
What inspired you to join TEA? Learning through real-world experiences not only cements lessons in students’ minds, but it also allows freedom and creativity to connect classroom experiences to real-life problems. I am excited to help show all that nature has to teach us and to inspire people to connect with and protect the natural world.
Where did you go to school? Colgate University, BA in Mathematics, Vanderbilt University, MS in Chemical and Physical Biology with a concentration in Molecular Biophysics
Do you have any special certifications? Member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, fluent in Czech
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I spent six months studying intensive statistical theory in Cape Town, South Africa, where I also took a course in African drumming and competed on the university’s swim team.
Merinda Zywicz | Middle and High School Spanish & Humanities Coach + Crew Leader
Merinda is from California and grew up spending time exploring and playing in the Sierras. She studied International Development with a focus on Latin America and Political Ecology. Her studies focused on trying to find solutions that balance the social, environmental and economic needs of the world, which makes her very excited to be at TEA where students grapple with those problems regularly. She has spent time working with non-profits that tackle these challenges in Ecuador, Chile and Costa Rica.
Prior to working at TEA, Merinda worked as a ski instructor and naturalist in Tahoe. These jobs helped her realize her passion for teaching kids in settings where they are empowered to learn through their own experiences and pursue their curiosities. Merinda also spent a year in Madrid, Spain where she studied Spanish and worked as an au pair to foster language acquisition for the three young girls in the family.
Teaching Spanish at TEA is a culmination of many of Merinda’s personal interest and she is excited to share her passion for the value of language with the students. Outside of TEA Merinda loves to ski, run, climb, bike and generally take advantage of the outdoor opportunities in Tahoe.
What inspired you to join TEA? TEA’s approach towards framing learning as a way of tackling real world problems as well as their acknowledgment of the value of learning through experiences.
Where did you go to school? University of California Berkeley, Bachelors in International Development with a focus on Political Ecology in Latin America
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I have skied in more countries than states.
Katy Kimple | Student Success Coach + Crew Leader
Katy graduated from SUNY Cortland in 2011 with a degree in Therapeutic Recreation became a nationally certified Recreational Specialist in 2012. Katy spent her first three years out of college working as a wilderness therapy instructor and found Lake Tahoe along the way. After moving to Tahoe, Katy has worked in many positions assisting people of all abilities and disabilities. She started a community integration program for adults with developmental disabilities in Truckee and South Lake Tahoe and then transitioned into working for Achieve Tahoe. Katy found her passion for teaching while working at Sierra Nevada College in Incline Village. Katy worked for three years as an Outdoor Adventure Leadership professor. Finding that taking students into the wilderness and out of their comfort zone was still a passion of hers. Most recently, Katy utilized her background in disabilities while working at Sierra Mental Wellness Group in social work.
What inspired you to join the TEAm? I believe that every child should have the opportunity to learn and grow in the outdoors and TEA does exactly that, creates growth through adversity.
Where did you go to school? State University of New York at Cortland, Therapeutic Recreation, BS in Science
Do you have any special certifications?Certified Therapeutic Recreation Specialist, WFR, ASIST, and Know the Signs trainer
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should?Backpacking is my jam…I’ve through hikes the Camino de Santiago in Spain and about 3/4 of the way through the Appalachian Trail.
Alison Levin | Project Manager + Real-World Intensive Coach + Crew Leader
Growing up in Alabama, Alison spent her days exploring the Cahaba, playing catch with her dad, and rooting for Auburn. Her love for education began as a kid when she’d hold class for her stuffed animals and build challenge courses for the front yard caterpillars. She spent her summers at camp and eventually followed a college friend up to the Finger Lakes where she became a counselor and outdoor instructor in Skaneateles, New York.
After 4 years at the University of Maryland (with a semester abroad in Cape Town, South Africa) Alison joined the Peace Corps and spent 27 months in the South Pacific. On a small island named Ambae on the archipelago of Vanuatu, Alison served as a community development advocate and English literacy facilitator. Alison focused on environmental education and incorporating creativity into the curriculum and teaching methods. She was on the Gender and Development Committee and ran several Training of Trainer workshops for the local educators.
Though the whole adventure was filled with successes and failures, some of her fondest memories come from forming a Women’s Committee and building a market house so that each woman can gain financial independence and empowerment with her own income and community role. That, and stargazing after a few shells of kava in the company of her incredible host mama and papa.
After the Peace Corps, Alison traveled for 6 months in Southeast Asia, hugged her family back home, and moved to Lake Tahoe where her camp friends had landed several years before. She has been here since, finding her favorite trails and learning how to ski – and loving every minute in this beautiful place!
Alison is thrilled to join the team and begin contributing to the collective vision. She already suspects that her inner child will become an honor student at TEA!
What inspired you to join TEA? The emphasis on connecting kids with the world: with nature as stewards to the land, with the local community as allies and advocates, and beyond as global citizens and changemakers.
Where did you go to school? University of Maryland, Supply Chain Management
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? If I’m not outside exploring, I’m either at a craft fair with my hand-lettered creations, at the Truckee Roundhouse makerspace learning something new, or in a hammock with a good book.
Joe Taylor | Middle and High School Real-world Intensive Coach
A Kings Beach local, Joe spearheaded the North Tahoe Boys and Girl’s Club art program and has served as its Director for the past four years. Joe has a proven track record as a community servant and works extremely well with children of all ages.
His experience, enthusiasm, and knowledge of his craft make Joe an extremely valuable asset to our community. His love for his subject and background knowledge are the ingredients that are necessary to give our students the skills to identify with their innate ability to recognize beauty while they practice a passion for aesthetics.
Katy Watts | College and Career Counselor + Registrar
Katy was born and raised in the Bay Area and has been happily working with teenagers since 2002, after she earned her MA in School Counseling and PPS from Chapman University. After 3 years in public schools in the Bay Area, she moved to the Middle East (Bahrain) in 2005 to focus on college planning and guidance, where she worked with international students seeking admissions to universities not only in the US, but in Australia, Europe, Canada and anywhere else they could imagine. She has also worked with students from low income and first generation backgrounds. Most recently she has been an external freshman reader for a top UC. Well versed in public, private and Ivy League colleges and universities, Katy also has experience with recruited athletes.
After working for eight years in two competitive private high schools in Houston as an Associate Director and Director of College Counseling, she and her husband and two children moved back west in 2015. She is starting her 4th year at TEA as the college counselor and was honored to help graduate the classes of 2017 and 2018 with 100% acceptance rates to college. Her focus has always been on guiding students in finding the right social, academic and financial fit for college. Katy continues to stay current on admission trends by attending local, regional and national conferences and visiting colleges and universities around the US.
Eric Martin | Athletics and Activities Director + Real-world Intensive Coach
Eric graduated from Salisbury University in 2004 with a BS in Business Marketing. At Salisbury, Eric had a standout lacrosse career — winning two National Championships in 2003 & 2004 and was named the 2003 & 2004 National Defenseman of the Year and the 2004 National Player of the Year. The summer following college, Eric was drafted by professional lacrosse teams in New York and California. After spending time on both coasts Eric made San Francisco home for the next 8 years, that is, while he wasn’t flying to/from or playing lacrosse games across North America. Eric enjoyed a nearly 10 year professional lacrosse career in the National Lacrosse League and Major League Lacrosse. Eric was a member of the US Men’s National Team that won the 2010 World Championship in Manchester, England. He’s a member of the Salisbury University Athletics Hall of Fame. Eric started working at TEA at the beginning of the 2011/12 school year. Prior to moving to Tahoe, Eric worked in sales and marketing within the sport and manufacturing industries. He directed and coached One City Lacrosse, a non profit that introduced lacrosse to underserved youth in San Francisco. He also co-founded and ran a lacrosse camps business. Eric believes that athletic participation and competition define character and perseverance. Eric will draw from his extensive professional background to help students discover and pursue their athletic passion.
What inspired you to join TEA? The opportunities and challenges that Lake Tahoe and its surrounding lands provide to everyone willing to step out of their comfort zone.
Where did you go to school? Salisbury University, BS in Business Marketing
Do you have any special certifications? High Sierra Lacrosse Board Member, Wilderness First Responder
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I’m a better cook than you.
Greg Wright | Marketing and Communications Director + Real-world Intensive Coach
Greg’s path to joining TEA was through the world of action sports. Prior to TEA, Greg was at the helm of an influential action sports publishing network whose titles included Freeskier Magazine and Snow Board Magazine. His particular area of expertise is branded content production and distribution, and he’s found an impactful application for that skillset at TEA. From our TEAFilms.org program to our yearbook, website blog, social media, and monthly feel-good email newsletters, Greg may have earned the title “Chief Storyteller” at TEA.
What inspired you to join TEA? The opportunity to use storytelling and content distribution to influence kids to solve real-world problems and advocate for causes they believe it.
Where did you go to school? Sierra Nevada College, BS in Business Administration with an emphasis in Ski Area Design, Layout and Management.
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I love to cook and have even won competitive cooking awards for my pork green chili (that’s made with 100% jalapeños).
Ken Martin | Finance & Operations Director + Title IX Coordinator + Middle and High School Math & Science Coach
Ken is a lifelong student & practitioner of leadership and management, having led teams in several military, corporate, & non-profit environments. Ken derives immense satisfaction from helping people use their talents to accomplish goals. Ken is deeply grateful for the opportunity to contribute to a school where the students are enthusiastic learners, where the teachers and staff are creative and passionate, and where the entire community pulls together time after time to support this unique and powerful program.
What inspired you to join TEA? Seeing students learn what they’re capable of when they’re tested by adversity. Seeing confidence, self-knowledge, passion, and purpose develop in students.
Where did you go to school? Vanderbilt University BE Chemical Engineering and University of Houston – Clear Lake MBA
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I love to sing, mostly in quartets & choruses, having performed for thousands of people in many different settings, from elementary school classrooms to nursing homes, theatres and sports venues including the NHL Predators at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena. As a teenager, I performed at the Palace Theater at Six Flags in St. Louis, MO. Most recently, I’ve performed with Nashville’s Music City Chorus in the 2018 BHS International Chorus Contest in Orlando, FL, placing 5th.
Laura Quarin | Middle and High School Program Facilitator + Humanities Coach + Crew Leader
Though originally from Canada, Laura’s love of exploration and travel have taken her all over the world. Laura has been fortunate to live and work in Canada, Australia, Panama, Egypt and now the United States. She has taught a variety of academic subjects, served as an athletic director in two different countries, worked as the humanities specialist and principal at a small school outside of Vancouver, British Columbia, and had an incredible first year at TEA as the Middle and High School Student Support teacher. Through Laura’s experience in various educational contexts, she has developed a passion for facilitating opportunities for young people to learn and grow in ways that inspire them. Her experience has taught her that given the right levels of engaging content, emotional support and academic challenge, all students can grow toward their own unique potential. Laura is a lifelong learner who follows her curiosity into historical non-fiction, through travel to new places and into the mountains as often as possible. She is grateful to have the opportunity to continue living out her passion for actively exploring the outdoors in the beautiful Tahoe area. Laura is in awe of the positivity of the entire TEA community and loves being a part of it.
What inspired you to join TEA? The incredible level of growth I’ve witnessed TEA students experience, both in their academic depth and character development, as a result of their emersion in real-world constructive adversity, is absolutely astounding.
Where did you go to school? Brock University – Bachelor of Kinesiology/minor in History; University of Wollongong – Diploma of Education; Western Kentucky University – Masters of Science in Athletic Administration
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? Laura has summited three of the highest peaks on the African continent: Mount Kilimanjaro, Mount Kenya, and Mount Meru.
Mara Morrison | Co-Director + Middle and High School Humanities Teacher + Crew Leader
Mara Morrison was born and raised in Oregon. Whether it was skiing Mt. Hood, traveling the world with her family, hiking the Pacific Northwest or camping up and down the West coast, Mara spent her childhood taking advantage of the beautiful world around her. Mara attended the University of Oregon to earn a Bachelor of Arts in History. After graduating, she moved to Tahoe and enrolled at Sierra Nevada College where she earned her teaching credential in secondary social studies as well as a Master of Art in Teaching. Her master’s thesis focused on using primary and secondary sources to teach about social injustices throughout history. Mara is passionate about connecting history to current events and sharing the passion for learning that she enjoys with her students. Mara has worked in a variety of settings with students ranging in levels from Kindergarten through University. In 2016, Mara joined the faculty at Tahoe Expedition Academy and has been the high school history teacher, 11/12th grade crew leader, Dean of Students, and Middle School and High School Director. Mara is passionate about bringing real-world experiences to the students of TEA and ensuring they have the skills and abilities to leave TEA to become courageous citizens of the world. She was drawn to her leadership position in order to advocate and support students, parents, and teachers while contributing to the “magic sauce” of TEA.
What inspired you to join TEA? TEA allows teachers to bring curriculum alive in order to make learning fun, challenging, and applicable to the real world. Traveling for fieldwork with students allows them to dive deeper into content, work with experts, develop a multicultural understanding of the world, and allows the student and teacher relationship to develop. When I see TEA students alongside students from other schools I am always blown away by their social and emotional maturity. TEA allows us to bridge the gap between rigorous academics, social-emotional learning and character development, and real-world adventure. At most schools, it is hard to implement change, but at TEA we thrive on it because we live in a dynamic world.
Where did you go to school? University of Oregon, B.A. History + Sierra Nevada College, M.A.T.
What is something that not everyone knows about you, but probably should? I love cooking and baking. I used to make wedding cakes and novelty cakes for special events.