Education Division Contact: Becky Jennings, Vice-Chair Goals: To promote Wilson County as a community that has achieved the recognition of excellence in Education. The Education Teacher Grant Breakfast was held on Wednesday, November 7th at the Lebanon Golf & Country Club. Pictured above are the 2007 Teacher Grant Recipients. This is the 12th year for the grant program, twenty-five grants were awarded totaling $10,882.01. Special thanks to Jackie Gaither, Cumberland Real Estate for his continued sponsorship. Jackie has sponsored the breakfast since 1995. Special thanks to the Nashville Superspeedway, Bridgestone Firestone, Bradshaw Foundation, Middle Tennessee Electric Membership Corp. and Outback Steak House for their sponsorship. Congratulations to all Grant Recipients! Listed below are the teachers, grant descriptions and the schools represented: Gailon Hassell Walter J. Baird Middle School $500.00 - This project - The UB's (Unique Buddies) will pair two students (unique buddies) that are from two totally different segments of the school population to work together, this allows students with disabilities and non-disabled students to interact, learn and appreciate each other's similarities and differences. Materials to be purchased from Lakeshore Learning Materials will include Hands on materials, puzzles and odd games; Money Hands on kit, the Allowance game, Write and Wipe clocks, Activity Posters and will cover Math, Science, Social Studies and Language Arts. Judy Metcalf Walter J. Baird Middle School $500.00 - Students will be using Hands on Laboratory allowing them the opportunity to extract, see and process their own DNA. Each student will extract their DNA from their cheek cells. Materials needed are hot water bath, electronic balance and glass cylinders. Christine Meredith Mt. Juliet Elementary $477.92 - Using grade level materials, the goal is to create and utilize a Kindergarten level social studies curriculum centered on Tennessee and the United States. Students will participate in daily activities based on a particular state, exploring 1-2 states per week. Students will be using a United States Map learning carpet, interactive globes and various books to create social study centers. Nelson Armstrong Friendship Christian School $500.00 - This grant will be used toward bulldozer work, trees, plants, flowers, topsoil, rock path and tools needed to create an outdoor Science Center for students of all ages. Students will plan and construct the center, giving them the opportunity to observe, experiment and learn science applications from an outdoor perspective. Marsha Reed Byars Dowdy Elementary School $500.00 - Students will be involved in brainstorming about how pictures make you think. They will then learn the process of painting a mural and study famous murals. This grant will purchase materials to paint a mural in the library creating an enchanting atmosphere. Total cost of this project is $700.00; library funds will provide the difference. Rochelle Duckwiler Friendship Christian School $378.80 - The purchase of a Baby Press Package will allow students the opportunity to discover the diverse history of printmaking with an emphasis on graphic design. Students will design a composition that incorporates text and image and by using the press, this allows hands on experience of printmaking. Toni Ross Friendship Christian School $320.00 - Students study how symbolism in quilting was used for survival and comfort in real life. The students will be quilting their own creations with materials purchased. Quilts will be distributed to those in need at the Brooks House and the Potter's House. Laura Henderlight Friendship Christian School $377.75 - Materials requested were Group Dip Hand mold, paper press, blender and paper vat, these items can be used repeatedly. Students will be making handmade paper from discarded paper from past projects. By learning this process, students are encouraged to discover the value in recycling in all areas of their lives. Karie Owensby & Julie Walker Friendship Christian School $500.00 - Each year, the 4th grade classes have a "Tennessee Party" as a culminating activity as part of their Tennessee studies. The party has a game show theme and is held at night so parents can attend. Students do research and work on questions and skits using famous Tennesseans. With this grant costumes representing famous Tennesseans, decorations and flags will be purchased and used for years to come. Shannan Tittle McClain Christian Academy $466.00 - With materials purchased, a Teacher & Student problem solving kit, thinking above the Standards kit, Minute Problem Solvers and Student materials for problem solving, the teachers and students have designated Fridays as "Problem Solving Fridays." The activities will encourage students to engage in various critical thinking and real world problem solving. In addition, teams will compete in Future Problem Solvers at both a state and national level. Krista Bright W.A. Wright Elementary School $500.00 - Students will use "Phonic Faces" to learn phonemic awareness, print awareness, alphabet knowledge, articulation, auditory discrimination and phonics. The program allows children to "see sounds" by imitating mouth positions shown in the cards. It is the only unique alphabet that shows children the letter-sound relationship by drawing letters within mouths to depict lip, tongue, nasal, teeth and voicing features. Connie Gatlin Akins Stoner Creek Elementary $499.80 - Binders and dividers will be needed for students to create, personalize, organize and utilize their own "Writer's Notebooks." The notebooks will be used in place of the traditional textbooks allowing the students to be actively involved in the elements of language and applying those to the writing process. Ella Parkerson Williams Watertown High School $500.00 - With the purchase of the software packages, Dragon Naturally Speaking, students will be using their voices to input information into the computer, using no hands. Voice typing is transforming the way people work, write and enter data in professional offices around the world. The students can implement the software in any course; the technology will enrich any course by providing hands-on experience with voice-recognition. Note: Total program costs $840.00, Principal Jeff Luttrell has agreed to fund remaining amount if teacher received this grant. Anna Summers Tuckers Crossroads Middle School $498.25 - Students will gain an understanding of the relationship between mass, force and acceleration through a series of hands-on lab based activities and demonstrations. Students will complete a series if lab investigations using various materials: Coin & Feather demo, Hand-held vacuum pumps, spring scale sets, dynamics carts, bulls eye levels, spare steel ball sets and a rotational inertia demonstrator. Susie Stephens Friendship Christian School $170.86 - This grant will fund various research books to show students that although our language seems to have many irregularities, inconsistent spellings and exceptions to rules, all of those strange words are markers to the past. Students will research the history of the English language and be exposed to the colorful past. Anne Weekes, Rebecca Gwynn-Dixon, Gina Smallwood EXTEND - Lebanon Special School District Gifted & Talented Program $500.00 - Grant will purchase 20 Webster New College Dictionaries and 30 Webster New College Thesaurus books to be distributed and used in the Extend classrooms. EXTEND is the top 10% of LSSD students. Tammy Sheppard Castle Heights Upper Elementary $496.53 - Microscopes, butterfly pavilion, hand magnifier, wild weather kit, anemometer and stream table kits are some of the items that students will be using in hands-on activities allowing the opportunity to analyze materials in both the classroom and an outdoor classroom. Sarah Rogers Byars Dowdy Elementary $404.97 - Economy Super loops, indoor adapter bases and set of disc are needed as students will learn and practice disc golf, giving the students an opportunity to learn a lifetime fitness activity. Darlene West Watertown Elementary $498.98 - Students will learn how to write articles, feature stories, editorials and produce a school news paper. Materials needed were Adobe Creative Suite 3 Design package and a Hewlett Scanner Package. Margaret E. Pfeffer Gladeville Elementary $500.00 - Materials needed were lumber, plastic covers, tarp, metal for table covers, soil, seeds, bulbs and students will be running water to the greenhouse that they're remodeling to create a laboratory environment to examine experiment and document the basic structure of plants. Lori Maasen Carroll-Oakland Elementary School $500.00 - The Reading Mentor is an electronic devise that incorporates sight, sound and touch for multisenory learning experience for students. The project will allow all students to work independently or with partners to practice letters, decode and pronounce words and master sentence structures. Leesa Hubbard Wilson Central High School $382.45 - Students will be given the opportunity to explore astronomy using models, hands-on laboratory investigations and group activities. The Starry Night software will bring a virtual planetarium into the classroom. Other items to be purchased are Astronomy Knowledge Cards, Constellation board game, Planet Quest, Mars and Night Sky Edition Monopoly. Patti Anderson Sam Houston Elementary School $230.00 - Students will be studying various leaders in the Hispanic, African American and Caucasian cultures that will inspire them to dream and achieve their dreams. Items needed for project are Bulletin boards sets with pictures of leaders, books highlighting influential people and photo enlargement for future leaders. Tra Smith West Elementary $444.70 - Students will have multiple opportunities through different hands on activities to discover and retain required grade level material focused on a science curriculum. Materials needed are Chemistry kits, 12 Kit series, glycerin, butterfly garden, test tube adventure and a bubble builder kit. Peggy H. Morris West Wilson Middle School $235.00 - The program, Bannatyne Reading, Writing, Spelling and Language is presented on four CD-Rom discs. The goal is to provide an alternate reading/language arts program of instruction to students who have not benefited from standard/traditional instructional approaches; this program uses integrated multi-sensory-motor involvement. Current Education Programs: School of the Month The Dr. Robert Carver Bone Academic & Mike Baker Scholarship to Cumberland University. (Applications available through HS Guidance Counselor) Teacher Grant (Extra-Mile Educators) Continue Growth of Endowment (501 3-C) Tennessee Scholars Program Furnish breakfast for Teachers at in-service. Support Teacher of the Year program. Teacher in the Workplace |