Melissa de Castrique Thomson is a prolific children's author and curriculum developer with over 15 years of experience in K-5 literacy instruction and leadership. With her specialized skills, she has successfully designed and led educational experiences for both adult learners and K-5 students. She's particularly adept at writing and editing texts for emergent, chapter book, and middle-grade readers. Her strengths also include providing actionable and transferable feedback on curricular materials and other written products, as well as streamlining complex ideas into easily understandable concepts for non-experts. Her former roles include Curriculum Developer, Humanities and Content Editor for Wit & Wisdom at Great Minds, Literacy Instructional Coach for K-5 students at Alexandria City Public Schools, and Teacher for Grades 1 to 5 at both City of Alexandria and Lycée Français de New York. Melissa holds a MAT in Elementary Education from American University and a BA in English from Davidson College; she is also a former Editorial Assistant for Sheshunoff Information Services.