Features

How Mrs. Belly Teaches

REYANSH K, Viaan Visveswaran, and VIREN L

June 10, 2026

Ms.Belly (History teacher) at IMS

Reyansh, Viaan, and Viren interviewed the American History Teacher Ms. Lisa Belly to learn how she keeps her history classes fun and structured. This interview also discusses her interests in becoming a history teacher and how she likes her job.

Panther Press: How long have you been teaching for?

Lisa Belly: This is my 17th year teaching at IMS(Iselin Middle School). I started my teaching career here and haven’t taught elsewhere.

Panther Press: How have you dealt with your students in the past years?

Mrs. Belly: Deal with them? Every year is different so you have to adjust. Usually I tend to think if you give respect you get respect back.

Panther Press: What was your favorite subject as a kid in school?

Mrs. Belly: Up until high school I had an interest towards science. But. I met a teacher who made history fun ‘he made it come to life’ my sophomore year in high school.

Panther Press: What made you want to be a history teacher?

Mrs. Belly: I mean, education has been in my family. Again, going back to my history teacher in high school. He made the classes fun and exciting and that’s when I wanted to teach history.

Panther Press: Did you find difficulty becoming a history teacher?

Mrs. Belly: Yes I did.

Panther Press: What made it difficult for you at times?

Mrs. Belly: What was really hard is passing the test to become a history teacher because you need to know all different kinds of history. You know, from American history to World history. So it’s difficult because there are a lot of things to remember and new evidence is always being found.

Panther Press: How do you structure your classroom to be disciplined?

Mrs. Belly: Depends on class, I don’t have a seating chart. I feel that kinda helps. Doesn’t get to the point. I set expectations and consequences and that helps make them stick through and following along with the lesson.

Panther Press: How do you make your classes fun?

Mrs. Belly: I try to find fun and engaging projects. Usually student response is the best way to get students what they want.

Panther Press: What made you want to teach this age group?

Mrs. Belly: That’s a good question. I know that 10-14 are the years that are the

hardest as a kid. I want to influence them to do good in school and make them have fun.

Panther Press: Honestly, what would you rate your profession on a scale of 1-10?

Mrs. Belly: I would rate it solid 7/10.

Panther Press: Thanks for letting us interview you!

Mrs. Belly: Anytime!

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About the Contributors

REYANSH K, Reporter

Reyansh K. is a student at IMS. He lives with his parents and sister, Mr. K, Ms.S and Miss K(sister). Reyansh spent his first few years in the U.K. and then later moved to India and finally settled in the U.S. He has been a student for over 6 years and has played chess for about 2 years. While he does like playing video games, his favorite thing to do is watch TV, especially One Piece. Reyansh’s hobbies include chess and track. He has no favorite sports team, but always enjoys watching other classic animes.

Viaan Visveswaran, Staff Reporter

Viaan Visveswaran is a student who goes to IMS. He lives approximately 50 seconds away from IMS. Visveswaran was born and grew up in Iselin, NJ his whole life. He lives with his mom and dad and his sibling, Aaryan Visveswaran, his kind, loving, cool brother. Viaan Visveswaran’s favorite hobbies are gaming, reading, playing soccer, and hanging out with family. His favorite soccer teams are FC Barcelona and Manchester United. Sometimes he goes on cool trips to places like Florida, India, Japan and more to come!

VIREN L, Reporter

Viren L is an IMS student. He lives on Green Street. He grew up in India and came to the USA when he was 9 years old. Viren has been studying at IMS for about 1 year now. He lives with his mom (Kavita), dad (Amandeep) but does not have any siblings..

Chloe S., Reporter

Chloe S. is a student at IMS. She lives in Woodbridge where she lives with her parents and still lives there. She has grown up in Woodbridge. She played volleyball for a couple years and had done dance before she did volleyball. Her birthday is on January 21. When she is not playing volleyball, her favorite thing to do is coloring, hanging out with her friends and cousins, playing volleyball, and drawing. Her favorite show is “Friends” and her favorite book is “Rebound.”