(Watercolor portrait of me by Lesya Malokhmetova)
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Hello!  I am Annie Monaghan, lover of the arts.

I am a Michigan native, currently living in Asheville, NC.  
When I was about 8 years old, I recall being on a car ride with my family.  I expressed to my mom that "When I grow up, I either want to be an artist or a teacher!" She kindly replied "Why not be both? You can be an art teacher!" And ever since that day more than 20 years ago, I have been pursuing my dream of becoming just that, an art teacher.  

After finishing my Bachelor of Arts with a K-12 teaching certificate at UNCA in May of 2014, I finally have the official title of "ART TEACHER!"

I have been teaching art at Carolina Day School in South Asheville since fall 2014.  I am excited and energized and inspired by the beautiful school and the insightful, empathetic and progressive staff.  I am teaching at the lower school and am overwhelmed with joy to be doing art with Pre-K through 5th grade students.  

I believe that art creation is a wonderful activity that can foster students' understanding of ideas, build their self-esteem, and help them to be unique, expressive individuals.  I teach in a way that merges art history, creative problem solving, interdisciplinary studies and integration of 21st century skills to help students to become confident, thoughtful, and creative characters.

I am very excited about my current opportunity to implement arts integration and interdisciplinary studies in the school system.  Much research has been done on proving that arts integration increases both student engagement in content being taught as well as heightening achievement levels in testing.  I am currently practicing interdisciplinary lesson planning and teaching, and I am determined to implement this in my career as an art teacher and here on my blog. 


I love teaching and I also love doing art myself.  When creating art for my own personal enjoyment, I prefer acrylic and gouache painting and am currently learning how to quilt.  I sometimes work with oil, watercolor and tempera as well.  I also enjoy drawing, ceramics, printmaking and crafting.  I have experience in many different visual arts from sculpture, oil pastels, origami, recycled arts, glue batik, sewing, face painting,  intaglio printmaking, weaving and photography.  I intend to continue my personal art education into the future.










....And this is my cat Kingsley....