Life is elementary

Day in the Life

AMY Paterson / photo editor Student teacher Karen Esser is a JMU student - but she's not around JMU much. Instead, her studies take her to Clymore Elementary in Fort Dix, Va.

Karen Esser is like any other college senior, except she doesn’t attend classes and rarely sets foot on campus.

As a student teacher, seven hours each weekday are spent instructing rambunctious 5-year-olds. "I’ve known that I wanted to teach since I was about their age," she said.

An interdisciplinary liberal studies major minoring in early childhood education, her semester is spent fulfilling two eight-week placements at local elementary schools.

Esser leaves the house every morning at 7:15 and drives 25 minutes to Clymore Elementary in Fort Dix. She works side-by-side with a teacher, learning the ins and outs of teaching kindergarten. The children arrive at 8:15 a.m. Now, the day really begins.

Mornings consist of reading in small groups, one of which is led by Esser. The children move on to "rug time," where Esser reads them a story. She also leads them through the hallways to lunch and various other activities such as gym and music class. In the afternoon, students complete a math lesson, followed by "center time," where various activities are set up for the children to do. When the bell rings, the day is not even close to the end for Esser. For an hour every day, she and her teacher draw up lesson plans for the following day and prepare the room. "The woman I work with is amazing," Esser said. "She’s been teaching for 28 years, and she just knows kids."

Esser usually arrives back in Harrisonburg at 4:30 p.m. "It’s a long day, but I love what I do," she said.

In January, she began by observing day-to-day lessons. Now Esser co-teaches and, in two weeks, she will assume full teaching responsibilities for the class. "Seeing the kids make progress is so rewarding. They’re learning to read, and the other day a boy had an "ah ha!" moment when he put a sentence together. Those are the moments I love the most."

Senior Carrie Martell, an interdisciplinary liberal studies major minoring in special education, feels similarly. "Spending those few extra hours with a student can make such a difference," Martell said. "I work with children who have reading and writing disabilities, and who haven’t passed their SOLs. Just to give them that extra help, that extra confidence, makes it worth it to me."

Esser will earn 16 credits this semester just from the student teaching, and she also attends seminars at Massanutten Regional Library with other education majors. "It’s weird not attending classes," Esser said, "and it’s harder to see friends when I’m never on campus."

Senior Kara Beatty, an interdisciplinary liberal studies major, also feels removed from friends sometimes. "I did my student teaching last semester in my hometown, and it was as if I wasn’t even a JMU student," Beatty said.

Working with young children has its humorous moments. "One time, after snack, a little girl shoved a bag of chocolate chip cookies down her pants," Esser said. "When I asked her about it, she said she was ‘saving them for later.’"

Although she was warned by her peers that working with children would be a hectic task, she doesn’t mind working with children so young. "They’ve been great," she said. "They’re adorable." In March, Esser will move on to a first grade classroom in Harrisonburg. Following graduation, she hopes to land a teaching job, and then simultaneously work toward her master’s degree. "I declared my major right when I came to JMU because there was never any question about what I wanted to do," she said. "This is what I want in life."