In her four years at K-Beach Elementary School, fourth- and fifth-grade teacher Heather Baker has never kept her lesson plans — or her classroom — quite the same.
“I’m a big proponent of student-driven learning,” she said. “So my classroom looks different every year, based on who’s in it. We read different books each year — I rarely read the same books, cause the kids in the class are rarely interested in the same things each year.”
Baker is the 2023 alternate for Alaska Teacher of the Year. She was one offour finalists for the annual recognition — awarded through the state’s Department of Education and Early Development.
North Slope Borough School District teacher Harlee Harvee, in Point Hope, was this year’s winner, DEED announced last month.
Baker is currently on family leave. Speaking on the phone from her home, she said that like her teaching practice, her path to education is unconventional.
She said it started because she was, at the time, a single mom of four kids.
“And I needed something that matched their schedules,” she said.
What began as a good fit for her schedule soon became a passion. And it melded nicely with her background in occupational therapy, working with kids who were on the autism spectrum.
That, combined with her own experience as a mother of seven, has influenced her appreciation for individualized learning.
“I just — I fell in love with the idea of meeting kids where they were, and helping them fall in love with different ways to learn,” she said. “Just because you're nine and you’re in fourth grade, doesn’t mean that you're in the same place as all of your peers.”
Elizabeth Kvamme is the assistant principal at K-Beach Elementary. She said the two dozen students in Baker’s classroom can pick and choose what will work best for them and their learning style.
“And so while everybody’s focusing on the same concept and working on the same concept, there are multiple ways to get there to master that understanding,” she said.
Fifth-grader Milo Bogart was a student in Baker’s class last year.
He said she could make any lesson engaging — even basic multiplication.
“Most of the people in the classroom have an energetic style, kind of like me, and her,” he said. “So she finds a way to go perfectly with everybody’s style of energy.”
School principal Janae Van Slyke said Baker is always incorporating projects and experiments into her classroom — including projects featuring the classroom’s many pets.
Animals are a big part of Baker’s lessons. For instance, her classes have raised and re-homed chicks.
“We have ended up with fire-bellied toads,” she said. “And one year we had Pacman frogs.”
Last year, students wrote her persuasive essays about why they should adopt another class pet. They worked on individualized, self-paced projects throughout the year, meeting with her one-on-one to talk about their research and to draw up budgets for animal care.
“And that was just a project that was unique to that particular year, because it was the questions that arose from those students,” she said.
She also connects her students with kids in other states — and countries. She’s worked with classrooms in Canada and on the East Coast that were reading the same books. Last year, her class Zoomed with a class in Colombia.
Baker is also a finalist for the Presidential Awards for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching, which Van Slyke said is a testament to the engaging remote work she was able to continue during the pandemic.
“Mrs. Baker is really passionate about teaching,” Van Slyke said. “She’s full of energy, and you can tell that she makes learning fun. And often, students will say that they didn’t realize they were learning afterward, they were just doing a fun activity."
Van Slyke said — that's the way it's supposed to be.
"We want learning to be fun," she said.
