ACTIONN VOICES

"...this experience has changed me forever and has changed the progress of my students in ways I didn't see before."

I’m Ken Rackley, with St Catherine Episcopal. I was teaching computers when a school principal encouraged me to go back to college to become a teacher. While studying education, a professor emphasized the importance of connecting to the life of the child outside the classroom, so the child knows you care.

I became a believer in relationship building with my students. The relationship is the key. But it needs to be a 2 way street, not where I stay in my bubble and I ask you to be vulnerable.

Five years ago, while teaching at Kate Smith Elementary I had the opportunity to go to Sacramento to learn about the Parent Teacher Home Visit Project.

I learned how Parent/ Teacher home visits build empathy between the teacher and family. I saw how transformative it can for the child’s achievement in the classroom.

So I came back and started doing home visits with each of my students. I have to tell you, that this experience has changed me forever and has changed the progress of my students in ways I didn’t see before.

One of those is a 2^nd grader who I’ll call Jamey. He was reading way below grade level when I first met him. When I made a home visit and met his family, his father told me how in the previous school year Jamey felt like a failure in reading. The parents even felt like their 6 year old was a failure.

Then Jamey showed me what he was building with Legos. What I saw was a boy with extraordinary spatial and mathematical reasoning abilities who was able to create cities and creatures without reading the directions! I could see the whole picture of this child and I understood better where he could thrive and how I could help him succeed.

I was able to share my perspective of Jamey’s amazing abilities with his parents and see their pride in him grow. I was able to boost Jamey’s confidence and this carried through into the classroom. He became a coach to his peers in math and he worked hard to become a better reader. His motivation grew and his parents helped. He grew more and more excited to show me his progress. He knew, and his parents knew, that I cared.