Anne Levy, 52, an award-winning Chicago elementary school science teacher who also lectured at Argonne National Laboratory, the Adler Planetarium and Northeastern Illinois University, died Tuesday, May 30, in Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge of liver cancer. Mrs. Levy was honored with a Best Practices Award from the Chicago Public Schools and had been a finalist for the Golden Apple Award for teachers. “Kids knew she loved them. Her philosophy on learning was: It’s fun,” said her husband, Clifford A. Levy. Born in Germany and raised in Chicago, Mrs. Levy was interested in science as a child. She went to Southern Illinois University, graduating with a bachelor’s degree in psychology in 1970, following it with a master’s in education from Northeastern Illinois University in 1976. She taught briefly before raising her son, her husband said, though she enjoyed a return to the vocation, teaching 7th and 8th grade science classes at Armstrong and Casals Elementary Schools in Chicago since 1989. Her science classes boasted spectral analysis of candy; viewing nosepickings under a microscope; and physics demonstrations that involved hurtling chalkboard erasers. “Her feeling was that if you try to teach a kid by intimidating him, he’ll shut you off. If you get him laughing, you can teach them anything,” her husband said. Mrs. Levy strove throughout her teaching career to keep her students laughing and to keep their learning hands-on. With adults, she evinced similar methods in math and science courses at Northeastern University from 1996 until 1999; she took and taught methods courses at Argonne National Laboratory, and was involved in a similar program at the Shedd Aquarium. In her hometown of Skokie, Mrs. Levy was a past president and served on the board of Fairview Elementary School District 72, was a board member in the Skokie Amateur Hockey Association (in which her son played) and co-founded the Treehouse Animal Foundation in Chicago. In addition to her husband, Mrs. Levy is survived by a son, Nicholas; and her mother, Ann Franchina. Services will be held at 2 p.m. Friday in the Haben Funeral Home, 8057 Niles Center Rd., Skokie.
