Kacey Potter, 8th grade English teacher in Rice Virginia, has earned more than $150,000 over the past five years by selling her curriculum to other teachers via Teachers Pay Teachers — lesson plans, PowerPoint presentations, activities, tests, thematic unit plans, worksheets, mini-courses. Facebook All About Me Back to School Activity is $1.50. An entire 7th-, 8th- or 9th- grade curriculum is $145.
“I started really getting into tech and teaching when our school first started using interactive whiteboards and I was the only teacher who could figure out how to use them. That snowballed into my blogging about my experiences as a teacher and what I think other teachers could do. I was excited when other teachers started liking what I was doing.” She started using Instagram after she started selling lesson plans and other curriculum: “I like for those who buy from me to know that I’m a real teacher, not a company.” She also collects ideas through more than 100 Pinterest boards (with more than 1,200 followers). “Pinterest is a great way to find ideas to use in the classroom — mostly from other teachers. I spend a lot of time looking for point-of-view resources, myself.” Learning cases of English grammar requires rote memorization, so Potter was pleased to find activities “that enable students to memorize without knowing they are practicing memorization.”
Potter was the technology teacher of the year for her county in 2011, the same year she started selling curriculum. “In every one of the three counties I’ve taught in, I was expected to create my own curriculum, so I had to create it all on my own.” Potter’s mother, also a teacher, was the person who directed her to Teachers Pay Teachers. “There weren’t a lot of resources there for what I’ve been teaching, so I got the idea that what I’m doing might help others.” She still buys as well as sells teaching resources. Now she teaches part-time and spends the rest of her time creating and selling curriculum. In this 10-minute interview, Potter talks about how she puts together curriculum units and what people do with them.
Banner image: screenshot of Kacey Potter ‘s web page on Teachers Pay Teachers
