Navigating a “winding path” before settling at PHS, Anna Rose Gable has been an English as Second Language (ESL) teacher for almost three years. A Rider graduate, her self-proclaimed empathetic approach to education was essential in her path to becoming a vital part of the PHS community. Gable’s progressive teaching style and ability to form connections with students creates a uniquely supportive classroom environment.

Gable credits much of her current attitude toward teaching to early experiences with public school. As a child, she first attended an unconventional public elementary school that encouraged a more holistic approach by allowing young students to learn comfortably and focusing on personal interests and creativity rather than on grades.

“I went to … an atypical elementary school [that] used a lot of Waldorf and Montessori principles. It was really project-based, … [since] we chose what to do based on our own interests. It was very hands-on and experiential, and we [received] a narrative report card that commented on our areas of strength and growth,” Gable said.

Gable’s transition to a more traditional grades-based system in middle school was a shock since she wasn’t prepared for its impersonality and shallow curriculum. For Gable, the flaws of this traditional system brought about a desire to educate in a manner that works the best for students, rather than just doing the bare minimum.

“My middle school was not great. In most of my classes, we read the textbook, we answered the questions at the end of the textbook chapter, and then we went on to the next chapter,” said Gable. “I was like, ‘I think that this could be better.’ I had kind of made this promise to myself that one day, I would go back and try to make education for older kids a little bit more like my education when I was a little kid.”

Going through high school, Gable’s interest in education flourished. After graduating from Yale and working as an environmental educator in Atlanta for five years, she relocated to New Jersey for family reasons. Gable then decided to continue her studies at Rider University, choosing to pursue ESL because of her formative experiences working with Atlanta immigrant communities. At Rider, the university curriculum along with the influence of her peers further refined Gable’s values in education and her teaching skills.

Along with two other Rider alumni, she participated in a series of conferences for the New Jersey Education Association. After recognizing the severe lack of subject material concerned with aiding English Language Learners, Gable and her peers decided that their input was needed. Later on, at their second NJEA conference, they presented translanguaging, a central principle in ESL programs.

“Translanguaging is using a student’s first language to help them access the content or the curriculum, but not in the sense that you’re just translating everything,” said Gable. “It’s rather like drawing connections to their first language.”

In addressing the diverse language proficiency levels in her classroom, Gable uses a teaching strategy called differentiation. Recognizing the challenge of reaching every student, she illustrates this approach using assessments. For intermediate-level students, it might involve multiple-choice options, while for more advanced learners, advanced learners, it might instead open-ended questions. To accommodate newcomers, Gable simplifies the process by presenting questions alongside pictures. Her ultimate goal is comprehensibility, an ESL buzzword that denotes the class material’s accessibility.

“The point is … [to] make the content of your class accessible, even if you share no language. … You just need enough support to get to that point,” Gable said.

Anuar Viruel Lopez ’25, a student in ESL English III with Gable, shared insight on the transformative impact of Gable, shedding light on how Gable’s guidance and support went beyond the classroom.

“I would say something that I learned from her is how to write better [in] my stories and also how to speak better and more formal[ly],” said Lopez. “Something [that] sets her apart is that she actually help[s] us and teach[es] us what to do and what’s wrong. … That’s why she is an amazing teacher.”

Gable’s doctrine of empathy and assistance is broadly felt, as demonstrated by a discussion with Dany Isaí Melchor Garza ’24, another student in Gable’s ESL English III class.

“She is always helping me. I don’t have that many teachers that I can talk [to] about my problems. … She is the only teacher that always hear[s] me and always support[s] me,” Garza said.

Gable highlighted several PHS initiatives aimed at supporting ELL students in an extracurricular fashion similar to how she does in the classroom. She noted a new peer group initiative last year that is conducted in Spanish, emphasizing its inclusivity. Outside of the ESL department, Gable recognized the efforts of the Latinos Unidos Club, where students learning English and their fluent peers can learn from each other and celebrate their diverse backgrounds.

Reflecting on recent progress at PHS, Gable has noted many positive changes towards incorporated inclusivity, such as the increase in the number of ESL teachers and bilingual aides. However, while the district has greatly improved on this front, she finds that there is still room for more bilingual staff in various departments.

“For a while, we had a bilingual front office secretary or administrative assistant. And having her meant that if my kid — one of my kids who doesn’t speak English yet — walks in the building and doesn’t know where to go, there’s someone they know they can ask,” Gable said.

Throughout her time as a teacher, Gable has viewed choice as a guiding principle. She feels that every student’s voice should be heard and that this voice should have the power to choose a path. In the ideal classroom, students would be able to pursue learning to the fullest extent using choice as the guiding principle. Gable believes that utilizing this principle requires empathizing with students and that using empathy to hear the voices of students is an essential prerequisite towards creating choice.

“I would like for every kid to feel they have choice in their education, to get to choose to work on things that are interesting to them, [and] to feel like they’ve learned something new every day,” said Gable. “I … have an attitude that every kid is worth it and every kid has something to say. … To be a good ESL teacher, you have to believe that everyone has something to contribute.”