The LEF Teacher Awards are just two weeks away and we are continuing to highlight all sixteen finalists.
Christy Taylor, a teacher at Woodvale Elementary, wants to make her classroom a second home for her second graders.
If you asked a younger Christy Taylor where she would want to spend her future, the classroom may have been the last place on her list.
All it took was one person to change that.
“School was not the best place for me until I had a teacher in high school who rescued me and challenged me and she put me on the path to education, Taylor said.
Now, Christy, decades into an elementary education career, hopes she is that teacher for her students.
In a colorfully decorated classroom with a cozy reading nook, Taylor uses lots of hands-on learning and an endless supply of hugs to teach her second-graders one thing above all else.
“Love is everything, Taylor explains. “Ultimately they’re not going to remember the math lesson that day but they’re going to remember that you love them.”
Taylor hopes to inspire a future where education is built on a foundation of love and understanding that children may need more than books and pencils to become informed and well-rounded people.
“I know we have to test and I know we have to get data and I know those scores are important but the kids will learn it and they wont forget it if you do it the right way. So my goal is to turn education on its head and I want to find ways that we can change instruction from a traditional to a nontraditional setting and still get the standards met that the state needs,” Taylor said.
