ARCHIVED—Recipient Bios
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Year: 1998 – Province: Alberta
Certificate of Excellence Recipients
Cheryl Andrews
School: Central Elementary School
Principal: Inge Ellefson
Grades/Subjects Taught: Elementary, all subjects
Teaching Approach:
- Engage children's minds in an atmosphere of love and caring.
- Encourage learning by nurturing children's innate curiosity.
- Promote self-motivation through a "project" approach, in which children choose the direction of inquiry, pose questions and seek answers through cooperation and collaboration.
Outstanding Achievements:
Devised a project approach for elementary classes that integrates all subject areas, including science, social studies, language arts, health and music:
- For example, a unit on pumpkins focussed on 40 pumpkins Mrs. Andrews brought in from her garden. Students wrote stories, drew pictures and sang songs about pumpkins and learned about measurement, graphing and vocabulary in math, science and language arts.
- Successfully introduced the project approach to Grade 2 students and, by remaining their teacher, continued its development in Grade 3.
Creates unique initiatives to make young children feel special: for example, the child of the week receives a book of positive comments from classmates.
Spearheaded student self-evaluation and student-led conferencing with parents, in which the child shows the parents what he or she has learned.
In 1997, all Mrs. Andrews' Grade 3 students, including one who is legally blind and another who is mentally disabled, wrote the provincial achievement tests. The school was recognized for exceeding expectations for excellence on the tests.