Anne Marie Bergen
2003 California Teacher of the Year
Ms. Bergen teaches Science to students in kindergarten through six grade at Oakdale Elementary School in Oakdale, California. She has been teaching for eighteen years.

What are your beliefs about teaching?
"Active learning, meaningful experiences, compassionate teaching - these three beliefs are at the core of my teaching philosophy. Throughout my teaching career, I have worked to engage students of all ages, learning abilities and languages using varied teaching strategies to empower them as learners. I believe if students have concrete, first-hand, active experiences, it is easier for them to work with more abstract concepts resulting in a deeper understanding of the subject matter. Active and co-operative learning experiences also provide students with the skills to communicate, to be patient, to be good listeners, to respect one another, and to work toward a common goal, building confidence and giving students a chance to become cooperative members of their community. In addition, students will learn best when they feel they are in a safe environment, there is mutual respect and they can count on being cared for even if they don’t get an answer right or make a mistake."

How are your beliefs incorporated in your teaching style?
"Providing students with class sessions that are meaningful increases the chance for student success. One of the highlights of teaching is the enormous availability of enriching curriculum that I implement in my classroom. Student activities that have emerged from my philosophy include a 4th Grade Salmon Project, Classroom Exploratorium, Great Poet’s Day, Point Reyes and Point Lobos Field Seminars, Dig: An Archaeological Expedition, Garden Club, Science Fair Assemblies, Elementary Shakespeare in the Park, Mona Pizarro’s Art Gallery and a written and illustrated book publishing project.

Continually seeking opportunities for students, I have written and received numerous Grants including competitive lottery Grants providing students with field excursions in the areas of social science, science and the arts. Other Grants include the CTAP (California Technology Assistance Program) grant for purchase of a video camera to enhance student lab experiences and several SPIE (Stanislaus Partners in Education) Grants to expose students to professional experiences and businesses. The Chinese proverb ‘I do and I understand’ greatly guides my daily planning for and interactions with students.

Besides creating active and meaningful learning experiences to connect students to their learning, my personal teaching style is one of high expectations in a structured environment surrounded by mutual respect. No matter what grade level or academic level, I provide clear guidelines for behavior and achievement in my classes. Using various best teaching strategies and building a climate of respect in the classroom, students are surrounded by the best possible atmosphere for success. Rarely do I have a problem with student behavior since students clearly know what they are expected to do and how it is they are expected to treat others, and are actively engaged in learning experiences."

What is your greatest teaching accomplishment?
"My greatest teaching accomplishments aren’t necessarily the activities I have done or the events that I facilitated. The greatest accomplishments are those split-second connections that I observe students making. Patrick’s animate conversation with a physicist discussing particle physics at ‘Dinner with a Scientist’, Kent’s mittened hand grasping mine on a moonless night-hike expressing his wonderment of the constellations and a comet rising above us. Kim’s intricate science project about the health of the Stanislaus River inspired by our 4th Grade Salmon Project. Melinda’s delighted voice declaring, ‘I love the smell of science Mrs. Bergen,’ as she excitedly walks into the science room, sharing a discovery or posing a scientific question. The enthusiasm for learning that students carry with them out of my classroom are my achievements!"

What's the most critical issue facing educators?
"One of the major issues in public education today is accountability. There is rarely a day when school accountability is not reported, discussed or editorialized in the written or spoken news. This strong push for educational accountability at all levels stems from an overall public perception that public schools are not meeting the needs of our students. Reports of how our students are not ‘making the grade’, that they are unprepared for work situations, and how behind they are when compared to other nations makes newspaper headlines, covers of magazines, and is often the topic of television or radio commentary. The California Standards and Content Standards have set very specific guidelines for teaching. These standards have aligned all grade levels in California as a way to ensure our students are challenged with the same high standards for achievement.

The Content Standards build from grade level to grade level providing a continuum of learning for students. Textbooks, testing, district expectations, and action plans are aligned with these standards to create a focus for teaching and learning. At a recent training, teachers were asked to give a quick response to ‘standards’. Replies such as ‘lots of assessment’, ‘boring’, ‘more is better?’ echoed throughout the room.

The teachers agreed that standards are great guidelines aligning instruction in California and focusing their daily instruction. However, as the standards trickled down to many districts, the teaching of them became much more scripted rather than conceptually driven. Throughout the state, implementation of standards has often made delivery of instruction much more restrictive leading away from delivering curriculum in meaningful ways to all of our students. Because of this and the huge pressure to increase testing scores, teachers, new and veteran, are discouraged from staying in the teaching profession, and the drop-out rate for teachers is phenomenal."

What do you think can be done to solve this issue?
“How do we balance the need for an accountability system to include the guidance of standards and measure of testing with the need for reaching students in multiple ways, hooking them to their learning, and providing open ended educational opportunities? First of all, schools and districts really need to promote what is going ‘right’ for their students and programs. Keeping the public informed of the strengths of student achievement and innovative learning opportunities for students allows the public to have another ‘measure’ for student success besides a published test score. Local newspapers, school newsletters, and local television and radio stations can be our allies highlighting achievements of our students, teachers and schools.

Districts need to create a positive environment that promotes innovative teaching methods to inspire teachers and connect students to their learning by widening the focus to cover important academic content and open the meta-cognitive doors for students. Motivated teachers create motivated students! Finally, educators need to constantly seek and promote ways to bring the best teaching practices into all classrooms. There are so many positive models that teachers can use to reach all students. We, as educators, first need to connect with our students' prior knowledge, build conceptual frameworks where students can place new learning, and give them ample opportunities to think about their thinking.

With increased public promotion of successes in our school as well as promoting innovative, best teaching practices, we can increase student achievement and have clearer measures of our pubic schools' successes.”

One thought to inspire teachers to excel
“I would like to use a quote from Dear Teacher that I feel summarizes how I feel about teaching. ‘Teachers who inspire perceive their task not as one of implanting facts, but to place the subject in front of the learner and through enthusiasm, imagination, and inventiveness awaken the appetite of the learner.' by Anthony Whitham"

One lesson every student should learn
"Strategies to become lifelong learners and respect for themselves and for other human beings."

Favorite Teaching Tool:
“My favorite teaching tools include two class sets of whiteboards with handles that my husband made. I have two sets. 3' x 3' for the intermediate grades and 2' x 3' for the primary. We use these whiteboards in group settings so that students can demonstrate their learning through drawings and writing as groups ‘share out’ their discoveries and understandings. Another tool is the overhead projector! I love this because I can always be facing students as I teach. I use a lot of overhead transparencies as they really focus my students on the work at hand. Lastly, I use the tools of effective teaching and class management that I have collected and perfected in the 18 years of teaching, active signals for students to engage and communicate with, my cooperative learning groups where each has a job to complete a task, and questioning strategies to help them deepen their understanding of concepts. “

Favorite Web site:
Astronomy – www.stargaze.org