Sterling Junior High science teacher Susan Honaas works with students during a hands-on physics lesson exploring Newton’s First Law of Motion.
Walk into Susan Honaas’s science classroom at Sterling Junior High, and students are actively thinking, talking, and testing ideas. Honaas, who has taught in Eastmont for eight years and teaches five blocks of seventh-grade science each day, recently earned National Board Certification, reflecting Eastmont’s ongoing focus on academic excellence through highly qualified educators.
During a recent lesson in her physics unit, students were exploring Newton’s First Law of Motion, the idea that objects at rest stay at rest and objects in motion stay in motion unless acted on by an unbalanced force. To ground the concept in something familiar, Honaas began with a short story connected to concussions in sports, using it to introduce what happens when motion is suddenly interrupted. From there, students transitioned into hands-on learning, rotating through interactive stations designed to explore inertia and force.
At one station, a LEGO figure rested on a toy car that was suddenly pushed forward. At another, a toy car rolled down a ramp with a penny balanced on top. At a third, students dropped trays of marbles or flicked stacks of pennies to observe motion and force in action. As each scenario was introduced, the class worked together to write hypotheses, adjusting their ideas as they observed the outcomes.
As students shared their ideas, Honaas encouraged clarity and precision, telling one student, “I love your deep thinking, and I challenge you to condense that thought for your hypothesis.”
This focus on intentional instruction connects to Honaas’s recent completion of National Board Certification, a rigorous professional certification process recognized as one of the highest accomplishments in education. The process encourages teachers to reflect on their teaching, analyze student learning, and continuously improve their practice.
Across Eastmont, seven more teachers have recently earned National Board Certification, with several completing the process as part of a district-supported cohort. Honaas shared that a mentor early in her career encouraged her to pursue it.
“She told me the National Board process was really reflective…that you learn a lot about yourself as a teacher and how you impact students,” Honaas said. “That idea of growing in my practice and becoming more intentional with my teaching really motivated me to go for it.” Reflecting on the experience, she added, “National Board Certification is a challenging, reflective process. It helps us take a close look at our practice so we can better support students and keep growing in our work.”
In Honaas’s classroom, that growth is evident in the way students engage with concepts, test ideas, and make sense of science through hands-on learning.
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