Dissertation Dive 6: "Developing Resilience and Enhancing Appraisals of Mattering Among Elementary Level, Non-Core Subject Teachers: Project DREAM." Dr. Pennington

Playing with Research in Health and Physical Education

Dr. Shannon Pennington is the Lead Teacher at the DREAM Academy in School District U-46, Elgin, IL. Dr. Pennington's doctoral studies at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign centered around trauma and its impact on student learning as well as social and emotional learning and support for teachers of marginalized subjects (e.g., art, music, physical education). In her current role, Dr. Pennington has initiated school-wide implementation of the Teaching Personal and Social Responsibility (TPSR) model in the alternative high school in which she works. She also supports teachers in an instructional coaching capacity and supports administration in its effort to build a model SEL school in Illinois' 2nd largest school district. She is in her 25th year of teaching which has included all grade levels from K-12 to higher education. As a graduate student, Dr. Pennington was named the H.E."Hek" Kenney Memorial scholarship award winner and a SHAPE America National Convention Curriculum and Instruction Scholar Lecturer in 2023. In this episode, Dr. Pennington discusses her dissertation titled "Developing Resilience and Enhancing Appraisals of Mattering Among Elementary Level, Non-Core Subject Teachers: Project DREAM."