Ben Baltes

Background

About Ben Baltes

If you're not struggling, you're not learning." In our classrooms, I teach kids to be OK with not knowing and to have a constant sense of struggling to learn. If they are not struggling, the question is too easy for them. If they struggle to the point of frustration, it can be too hard. My aim is to instill in students the love of learning and the discomfort it sometimes feels not to know the answer. My classrooms are full of questions that challenge and inspire students."Should we sacrifice freedom for the sake of national security?""Why is the answer 12?""What action can you take so that you can extend what you have already learned?""How does your answer lead you to another question?" This level of inquiry and discovery is not only encouraged in our class - it's essential to the learning that takes place. I only wish this second career were my first. True, I'm making about 1/3 of the pay I did in the corporate world, but this is far more fulfilling and fun, frankly. Watching those light bulbs go on in the kids' heads are what forces me to keep challenging students and coming up with new methods of differentiating for each learner. Prior to my career change in 2009, I was a corporate marketing person for 25 years with a major company. Then, after the recession in that same year, my whole level of management was eliminated. At the same time, my daughter was just entering kindergarten, giving me time to volunteer in her classroom. I was amazed and awed by the learning taking place. Immediately, I sought a way to get my teaching degrees (one bachelor and two master's degrees) and was hired immediately upon completion in my daughter's district and taught 5th grade. Seeing opportunities to teach internationally allowed our family to move to Dubai where I have taught 3rd grade and now 8th grade Social Studies / US History. Our daughter graduates from high school this year and we are looking for our next international teaching opportunity. My wife is a K-12 librarian and has over 20 years of experience. We'd be happy to have a conversation with any school that is interested in our skills and abilities.