Mr. Jonathan Thomas

Business M-Week Class

This class with be an interactive way for the students to learn about how starting and running your own business works.  This class is divided into three groups who will be starting their own company and they must assign a position in the company to each member of their team.  They will conduct meetings on marketing, finance, operations and many other topics.  At the end of the week, their company will go public and sell their ownership of the company in the stock market.  The price per share will be decided by me based on the perceived strength and success of the company during the week.  We will be watching a TV show in this class called Undercover Boss and a video by PBS explaining desire in the market (http://video.pbs.org/video/1479100777/). This show follows CEOs who go undercover in their own company and work in their stores in order to get a different perspective of how things are working in the company.  My desire in teaching this class is to show the excitement of working in a company but also the difficulty in starting your own company and how they can overcome those difficulties.

Physical Education                                                                   

Email: jthomas@madisonprep.org  

Office Hours: Monday, Tuesday & Friday 7:30-8:00 am

My Bio

My name is Mr. Thomas and this is my first year of teaching and my first year here at JMPS.  I graduated in 2008 from none other than James Madison Preparatory School!  I am so excited to be back on campus as a teacher.  I worked as an intern for the 2011 semester here at James Madison to finish the last requirements for my degree and I graduated in December of 2011.   My degree is in Exercise and Wellness: Health Promotion and I minored in small business.  I am now a contracted employee here at James Madison and this job is changing my life. I love working with students to show them the joys of sports and exercise.  I also feel it is important for my students to learn the good character qualities of an athlete.  I coach girls basketball and I very much enjoyed this last season.  I cannot say how much I enjoy the students, faculty and parents that I interact with teaching here at James Madison.

I love anything that requires my body to move, which includes hiking, jogging, biking, jogging and basketball.  These are just the activities that I do on a regular basis. I enjoy playing almost any sport and competing in any way. I rode in the Tour de Tucson in 2010 and in my first ride I came in the top 25%. Basketball is my absolute favorite activity.  I played on the JMPS team for three years in high school and I played in an inter-mural league for one year at ASU.  Again, I am excited to be teaching PE.  I have a great deal to learn but I am excited to work with the students here at James Madison.

Classes

7th-9th Grade PE

The purpose of these classes is to give all of the students at least 30 minutes of physical activity everyday.  The way I run my classes is each trimester, the class is divided into three or four teams.  These teams will compete for points throughout the 11 weeks we have class.  I give points out for having everyone in the group dressed out for PE, winning games, being respectful and going above and beyond.  At the end of the trimester, the team that wins will receive a prize.  My curriculum is comprised of football, ultimate frisbee, volleyball, basketball, soccer, dodgeball, lacrosse and possibly others.  When we learn a sport, I teach them by starting out with the fundamentals and then we move into playing a season.  The teams chosen at the beginning of the trimester will compete against the other 3 teams.  Their season record will determine their position in the playoffs.  Their will be a semifinals game and a finals game at the end of the season and the winner of the final playoff game will be crown the champion of that sport.  My desire is to show the students the joy of physical activity through this class.

10th Grade Weight Training

Once a student turns 16, he/she has reached the age where he/she is able to strength train with extra weight exerted against the body.  The process of lifting weights needs to be taken seriously as improper form can lead to acute or chronic problems.  In this class, I teach the students about muscles and how to properly work out in the weight room. 

12th Grade Kinesiology

This is an elective that seniors may take with me.  We study the motions of the body and how the body moves and contracts muscles. We also go over some of what personal trainers need to do when working with a client.  We are in the weight room working out two of the five days of the week.  Any senior who is going into a health degree, especially personal training or physical therapy can benefit greatly by taking this class.  Anyone who just wants to learn about the human body may also find this class fun to take.