The Inspiring Teacher Project

"Mike Roberts draws on interviews with many of our most dedicated, honored, and celebrated teachers to get insights and examples of what it means to be a teacher. We all learn best by examples and analogies, and these teachers prove that time and again. This should be required reading for all who enter the teaching profession." Dr. Max Thompson, Founder of Learning Focused Inc.

Saturday, December 29, 2012

If I Could Start My Own School I would....




I think every educator has thought of starting their own school. What would your school look like?

Randy: I have always thought of starting my own school. I think the biggest area of need right now is in the middle schools so I would start a middle school. This is where we start to lose kids, meaning they start to move down a path of dropping out or just becoming disengaged. I would start an experiential middle school with a variety of different things available for students. Our area of New Hampshire is rural. I would like to have the ability to take kids and have them work on a farm for a block of time. While there the students could be taught the standards and curriculum through the real world of farming. They would study chemistry, biology, gardening, mathematics, etc.
     At my school I would have the ability to take field trips often - the ability to put students on a bus and drive down to Boston to visit museums at any time. Field trips are critical for pulling in material that you just can’t teach within the four walls of a classroom. Teaching only within the classroom walls is not the best way to get the active culture that I would want in my school. 

Randy Wormald is the 2005 Disney High School Teacher of the Year. The above is an excerpt from my book One-on-One With America's Most Inspiring Teachers.