I am a:<\/strong> Reading Teacher, Mayo Elementary School | 2017 Teacher of the Year Semi-Finalist<\/strong><\/p>\n My philosophy of teaching and learning can be captured in one word: relationships. I believe that building relationships with students and staff is the glue that holds all the essential components of teaching and learning together. I consider this to be my most accomplished strength as a teacher.<\/p>\n As a National Board Certified Teacher I understand that teaching and learning does not exist in a vacuum. In order for students to learn, relationships must be built. These relationships are built on a foundation of respect and understanding. I recently had an opportunity to spend time with a former student. She was a child I admired because she worked hard, had a positive attitude and was kind to all of the students in our class. I had an excellent relationship with her, and yet she recently shared circumstances about her childhood that I didn\u2019t realize. She told me that I had a profound impact on her at a very difficult time in her life. As Erin Gruwell stated in her book, Freedom Writers, \u201cYou never know the impact you\u2019re going to make with a person.\u201d<\/p>\n Relationships are the foundation of the important work I do with teachers as a Literacy Coach. I call the teachers at Mayo Elementary \u201cmy work daughters,\u201d making personal connections daily with them. When they are at school, I want them to feel understood and supported. I use the Gradual Release of Responsibility model (I do, We do, You do), to facilitate the learning of literacy instruction. I instruct teachers on how to determine students\u2019 strengths, weaknesses and reading level using the Fountas and Pinnell Benchmark Assessment. I model the process for individual teachers and collaborate with them in analyzing students\u2019 reading performance. By supporting teachers in their learning, I am increasing student learning.<\/p>\n My strength as a teacher is the relationships I build everyday with students and teachers in order for teaching and learning to occur at the highest level.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" “I believe that building relationships with students and staff is the glue that holds all the essential components of teaching and learning together.”–Nancy Hack-Behringer, Mayo Elementary Teacher<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1001013,"featured_media":13302,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_expiration-date-status":"saved","_expiration-date":0,"_expiration-date-type":"","_expiration-date-categories":[],"_expiration-date-options":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[130,132,147,207],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aacps_story","category-employee_stories","category-south_river_stories","category-toy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1001013"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13300"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13300\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13303,"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13300\/revisions\/13303"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aacpsschools.org\/development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}