Priscilla Richardson

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I received such a surprise when I first saw it -- the "it" being the list of the 17 McGlothlin Awards semifinalists. From an area covering Washington County to Amherst, two, count 'em two, are from Botetourt County, and both teach at Troutville Elementary. Clearly something wonderful is going on at Principal Karen Crush's school.

That wonderful something includes one semifinalist, Sherrie Gardner, 39, who's in only her second year at Troutville Elementary. Crush suggested all her teachers apply for the award, the winner of which will be announced in February. The principal gets only reflected glory, but the winning teacher will get $25,000, of which $10,000 must be earmarked for international travel. I have never known a teacher for whom that would be a problem.

The application process requires the teacher to give details about how he or she would spend that 10 grand. Gardner said she would use it to visit a former colleague who now teaches in Vienna, Austria's International School. Gardner's first-grade students are pen pals with one of the classes there, where children come from all over the world. She would divide her visit between the school's term, to see the class in action, and its vacation, when she would travel and see the country. This would be quite a thrill for someone who, as she said, has "never been overseas."

Even if she gets no closer to the trip than her plans, Gardner has already fulfilled a main requirement for the award. "They want to know how you bring the world into your classroom."

With this group, ages 6 and 7, "the world starts with themselves and family. You work on developing that sense of self, family and community, as the concept of national and world is so big for them."

One example of how she does that took place in December when her class learned about the different ways people celebrate during the holiday season.

"One day was especially wonderful," she said. "One student's mother speaks Spanish, so we learned about Christmas in Mexico. And we matched up the words for numbers in English with the same words in Spanish."

The other semifinalist, Rebecca Boone, 59, a Troutville teacher for 30 years, uses science to bring the world into her kindergarten classroom.

"I feel everything you do is science," Boone said. "It's a way of thinking and decoding and analyzing and a way of coming up with conclusions, so I teach that. We do experimenting, and I ask kids questions about what we did and what they think."

As an example, in the spring she uses water tubs outside on a pretty day. "Everyone gets a lump of clay, and they have to make a boat that will float. They work and work; they get it done. It can't be too thick, too thin, so they learn a lot of science on that one task."

For a study on American Indians, Boone used a real millstone. "The kids were grinding their own corn, and then they made cornbread with it. So they learned what Indians had to do to acquire food. It was fun -- nobody mashed a finger, that was a good part -- but it was the science of food and how they did it." Her students learned that the women did most of the work, too.

For the same study, Boone had her students construct stick spears, using sticks she gathered. They added feathers and tested the performance of the spears with and without them, to see how they went. They saw that the ones with feathers went farther. "These are all hands-on activities," she said. "When they don't know an answer and they ask me, I say, 'I don't know but here's how we can find out.' "

Interestingly enough, this fun covered some Standards of Learning, too, in science and math. The children had to measure when making the cornbread and use their hands as a nonstandard measurement tool when making their spears.

With her interest in science, Boone said, her plan for the possible travel award is a research trip to the Galapagos Islands, to study the unique animals isolated there.

With teachers such as Gardner and Boone, no wonder kids today are so smart.