English teacher Ms. Sara Yates loves two things: teaching and Halloween. She reflects on what this has taught her in her eighth year of teaching.

“What I have learned from this profession is that sometimes adults get so busy with being adults as well as being around teenagers that sometimes teens can teach us that there are a lot of things that we don’t know when we think we know everything,” Yates said. “I like that kids teach me stuff every day.”

One of the main reasons Mrs. Yates loves Halloween is being able to dress up, be something different, and act as a character, especially because it’s one of the only holidays you can.

“Around mid-September, I start putting up various decorations including skeletons and DIY items, but I start prepping months in advance,” Yates said. “Me and my family always watch a scary movie some night in October but recently in the past few years we have been watching Hell Week’”.

Halloween has been a part of her life for as long as she can remember. 

“I don’t get scared too easily, but jumpscares are usually the only way I can get actually scared,” Yates said. “I have yet to have a supernatural experience, but my mom and I both think there have been weird things going on at the house, including times where we both think we didn’t turn off the lights and off scenarios like that.”

Ms. Yates has various activities that put her and her family into a spooky mood including carving pumpkins.

“Carving pumpkins we do as a family every year and sometimes paint them as well, but we also do more of the scary stuff including haunted houses and dressing up,” Yates said. “I haven’t gone to any haunted houses this year but the scariest one I went to in my life was the Haunted Barn in Louisville.”

In addition to pumpkins and haunted houses, there is a more fun and social side to the spooky fall holiday.

“We used to host an annual Halloween party at our house but ever since we moved houses we haven’t gotten to it again,” Yates said. “Our family last year all dressed up as some of the classic Halloween costumes and that was my favorite in recent memory, we had Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, and Ghostface.”

Ms. Yates likes to get into the mood with lots of audio and visual storytelling.

“I don’t read too many Halloween books, but I do read lots of true crime stories,” Yates said. “I listen to ‘Full Body Chills’ podcast as well and even though I’m not a big gory movie kind of person I do love thriller movies and of course the classics.”

Scaring kids last year has been Ms. Yates’s favorite Halloween memory.

“My biggest piece of advice to have fun this holiday is to not care what other people think,” Yates said. “ A lot of people are too scared of what other people may think about them dressing up but they should just do it. If you’re just getting into it I would suggest watching a few of the classic movies and being in the Halloween spirit.”