Cross Case Features: Teachers

Meridian High School: Language Arts

Tony Mathews, Tenth-Grade English

Tony Mathews, who teaches tenth-grade English at Meridian High School, finds the English textbooks barren of Asian material. He developed a unit on Asian approaches to naturalism and reflection, focusing on various literature and art examples. In an effort to try a cross-disciplinary approach, he allows students to turn in an art response as a “book report.” Noting that some students come into his classes associating Asia with martial arts, he works to expand their knowledge of these areas with an understanding of Asian philosophies and cultures.