I teach in a rural, public elementary school with 400 students in grades 4K-6. Many students choose to participate in sports, Destination Imagination, music, and band. We keep our class sizes small, with 16-20 students in each classroom in grades K-3. In the upper grades, 4-6, we have an average of 25 students in the room. In this way, we can offer as much personal attention to each child’s needs as possible.
My students are excited to learn, but the poverty level is high with a 52% free and reduced-price lunch population.
Nonetheless, my school tries very hard to afford all students the same opportunities, no matter what social or economic situation may exist in their lives. All students are offered free breakfast, and we have a peer mentoring program run by our high school students that attends to the primary students' socio-emotional needs and offers free supper as well.
Personally, I take time to get to know each child in my classroom as a whole person. My goal throughout the year is to understand their academic strengths and weaknesses as well as their character strengths and weaknesses. I love being their teacher and cheering them on.
My Project
Our Fourth Grade Team has been to focusing on kindness and accepting all people from all cultures of the world. We are meeting twice a week as a whole fourth grade and reading a book on a Kindness theme. This theme becomes our goal for the week. The students have teamed up with high school students and 4k students to work on various community projects on spreading kindness. We are even leading our elementary school in a Kindness Matters, Everyone Matters Initiative.
Literacy is a great resource to guide students into thinking about the world as an inspirational place of diversity!
These books will help lead our discussions on our kindness focus and help our students focus their goals for the week. The students love hearing stories about solutions to various real life situations and making connections on how to improve their own lives. Learning through literacy and team building discussions will help create a positive culture in our school community.
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Mrs. Smith and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
