Teen of the week: Dance teacher Kimberly Bolton shows all tlhe right steps to Jacobsville students | Maryland Gazette (HometownGlenBurnie.com)

"I like the looks on their faces when I give them something really cool and they really like to do it," the 18-year-old Pasadena resident said.

She volunteers as a dance teacher at Jacobsville Elementary School for fourth- and fifth-graders every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon for an hour. She also teaches two classes, one for 4-year-olds and one for 5- to 7-year-olds, at the Glen Burnie Recreation Center.

"She has great rapport with the kids," said Judy Schmid, the physical education teacher and dance instructor at Jacobsville who oversees the dance program. "She has an incredible teaching ability."

Kimberly hopes to put those skills to work in the future as an elementary school teacher. The Anne Arundel Community College freshman, in addition to teaching four dance classes a week, is a student teacher at Pasadena Elementary School for work-study and is a supplemental teacher for the biology 101 class at the community college, which she tutors twice a week.

A lot of people ask her how she puts up with all those students.

"It's so cool to see them learn something," Kimberly said of teaching the dance students. "You just have to understand they don't think the same way we do."

Not only has Kimberly taught these classes for three years, she's been taking her own dance classes for 15 years. She attended

Edna Lee Dance Studio until she was 10, when her family moved from Brooklyn Park to Pasadena. She also takes four classes at the Glen Burnie Recreation Center - ballet, point, tap and jazz. She also took a college level hip-hop class last summer.

One might wonder why Kimberly isn't pursuing dancing as her career, but for her, it's just a longtime hobby.

"I love dancing, but I don't want to make a career out of it," she said. "I just do it for fun."

For a while, Kimberly wanted to be an architect, but found that teaching was her true calling once she started taking education classes. She remembers making her brother play school with her in their garage when she was 10.

At Chesapeake High School, she was involved in various activities, which included dancing and teaching. She participated in the spring and fall musical productions, sang in the chorus, tutored algebra at Chesapeake Bay Middle School, and was a member of the National Honor Society and the school's thespian society.

She's now in her second semester of college and plans on going to Towson University in the fall of 2009.

In addition to her teaching endeavors, Kimberly also works part time at Ledo Pizza and babysits a 3-year-old and 1-year-old on the Friday and Saturday nights that she doesn't have to work.

"I used to think there weren't enough hours in the day for all the things she's interested in," said Jenny Bolton, Kimberly's mother. "Between March and May, she would have to remember 12 different dances and her little kids' dances."

"I haven't had a lot of free time lately because I've been taking on so much," Kimberly said. But she loves what she does, and her students respect her.

"They call me Miss Bolton," she said. "They're so fun."