April 1, 2004

Graystone Elementary School Teacher Erika Huerta wins KTVU’s Best Educator Award

By Lorraine Gabbert
Staff Writer

Graystone Elementary School is celebrating its teacher Erika Huerta, a recent recipient of KTVU’s and Sylvan Learning Center’s Best Educator Award. She is one of only eight teachers selected in the Bay Area, and will be featured on KTVU’s public announcement spots for a month. She will also receive a $1,000 gift certificate for teaching supplies and continuing education courses. “I’m very excited to represent San Jose and have KTVU come out (on April 23) and see what we do,” Huerta enthuses.

“It’s not just a job, for her, it’s a passion, and a love for teaching,” comments Allison Johnson and Betty Newkirk, who nominated Huerta for the award. “Our community is a better place today because of her strong and positive influence on so many young lives. Her energy and enthusiasm are endless, and her beautiful smile and attitude brighten every day.”

Receiving this award came as an exciting surprise for Huerta. “I didn’t even know I was being nominated,” she shares. “I just really love my job. When someone nominates you, it’s an amazing feeling, but I’m just being me. Right before I left to get married, our principal, Jerri Kazmierczak, handed me a packet, and said ‘it would be good reading material’ while I was gone. It was all the letters the parents had submitted with the nomination, and I realized the impact I’m having on these kids. I treasure these letters. After we returned, there was a message from Jerri saying ‘I want to be the first person to tell you that you won the award!’ This is really a huge honor for me. I love my children, and I just put whatever I can into my class.”

“She’s a superstar,” asserts Kazmierczak. “The kids just love her. She goes out of her way, and will do whatever she needs to do to help the children succeed.”

Previously known as Miss Gordon, Huerta has enjoyed teaching second grade at Graystone for nine years. “I really love second grade. It’s been a good fit for me,” she comments. “I love the age, the curriculum, and teaching them to be better readers and writers. There’s so much learning going on, and they still love their teacher.” Yet, every year, she tries to add new elements and teaching strategies to her repertoire to keep it exciting. “I try to create an environment that I would want to learn in, and provide the children with activities that are fun—but the foundation of learning is there,” she says.

To encourage children to read, especially books they might not otherwise pick up, Huerta created a “Letter of the Month” program in her classroom. Each month, she features authors by the first letter of their last name, in alphabetical order. At the end of the month, the class shares in a book group party. “We discuss the characters, setting, plot, conflict, and resolution, and have fun with it,” says Huerta. The book party also features treats starting with the letter of the month. “The children love ‘Letter Party Day,’ and it’s all learning and reading,” she adds.

Huerta centers class activities around “Peter Rabbit” as one of the core literature stories in second grade. “In one version, he loves to drink chamomile tea, so I had this brainstorm to create a big tea party,” she says. “We send out invitations, and the kids bring in tea cups and saucers, and we eat little finger sandwiches and carrots and celery. I’ve also collected Peter Rabbit dishes. It’s just a really fun way to celebrate the book.”

Huerta incorporates this philosophy in all areas. “I call my kids ‘Love Bugs’ and in science, we study insects, including ladybugs,” she notes. “We make a ladybug house, do experiments with ladybugs, have a ladybug party, and we even make ladybug cookies.” When they study weather, the children become meteorologists. “I have a whole weather center where they go out and check wind speed, and precipitation, and we made a barometer so they can check the air pressure. They even know the cloud types,” Huerta says. “They come in and do forecasts in the morning for us. I try to find a way for them to get involved in whatever we’re learning rather than just doing a workbook. Sometimes people think I’m not teaching the standards, but all the standards are being met—just in a different way. I feel that it’s just so much more fun [this way] and if I was seven, I’d rather go out and look at the clouds than just read about them. My style is just how I would have liked to learn.”

Fulfilling a personal goal, Huerta also produced “The Wizard of Oz” featuring her second graders. “I wrote the script, and we had music and dance, and turned the cafeteria into Emerald City,” she recalls. “We had a lot of parent support, and we worked hard, and put on the play for the whole school. The next year we made it even bigger and better. The costuming and the staging was even more elaborate, and we created tremendous sets with the aid of artistic parents. It was phenomenal and the highlight of the school year.”

In Huerta’s classroom, they speak their own language. They have “Elbow Rules,” and “Belly Button Rules” and put on “Turtle Shells” and “Rabbit Ears.” “My kids know what ‘Rabbit Ears’ means—it’s an activity where they need to move faster,” she remarks. “It’s a way of learning to pace themselves. Is this an activity we need to get done, or can we take our time with it?”

She also teaches the children Spanish throughout the day. “Parents tell me that the children come home saying they had a muy bien day and it’s an amazing feeling for me hearing what they say at home,” she says. “That’s what keeps me going, especially on those days when they’d rather be outside playing, than listening. I had a praise note the other day from one of my kids saying, ‘You’re the best teacher in the world. You make me smile, and you help me to learn so many things.’ The letters I get from these kids are amazing, and if they write me a letter, I write them back. I carry on a relationship with my kids and I try to give them a lot of me.”

Newkirk and Johnson believe that Huerta is one teacher that the students will never forget. “They know she’ll never stop caring for them,” says Newkirk. “She believes in her kids and they know it,” states Johnson, “and there are no bounds to what you can do when you feel that way. It’s incredible to see the way she touches the lives of each of her students.”

Parent Karen Haley agrees. “It takes a lot of time and energy to teach the way Erika does,” says Haley. “She is the kind of teacher that 30 years from now, our daughter will be telling her children about. We are very grateful for the many things she taught our daughter, and for sharing her gifts of creativity and caring.”

Huerta believes in incorporating positive reinforcement, cooperative learning, and teamwork into her teaching. “I tell them that we’re a classroom family, and together these are the things we can do. I not only teach academics, but also life skills. I try to teach them resiliency, to become independent thinkers, how to be good peace builders, and a good friend, how to deal with conflict, how to problem-solve, honesty, and respect. The kids respect me because I respect them. Our motto is, ‘personal best.’ We do our personal best at all times. These are just things that run through my classroom.”

“She’s full of novel ideas,” says parent Alison van Diggelen. “When it’s someone’s birthday, a special puppet (Miss Olivia) comes out and sings to the birthday child. It’s very cute. It felt special being in her classroom, because when you volunteer, your child gets to choose what kind of clap he wants, like fireworks ‘oohs’ and ‘ahhs,’ or a round of applause. She gives the kids a lot of extras, and fosters a feeling of being a team. The children revere her.”

After graduating with a bachelor of arts from San Jose State University, Huerta received her masters in children’s literature, and her teaching credential from the University of Santa Barbara. Before teaching at Graystone Elementary School, she taught preschool at Challenger.

“I always knew I wanted to be a teacher,” she reflects. “You remember those teachers who you just loved and who stand out in your memories, and I always wanted to be one of those teachers. I really don’t know how to be less than what I am, or do less than what I do. When I have to walk away from this profession, it will be the time when I can’t give that 120 percent.”