Public Servant Spotlight — Rachael Matern: Every child is different

Posted on Tuesday, January 20, 2015 at 5:12 pm

By Daniel Sherrier

Editor

 

Rachael Matern remembers several great teachers from her school days, particularly a few middle school teachers who would go out of their way to push her toward the next level, help her out in any problem areas, and generally make the classes fun and engaging.

Those educators inspired Matern to become a teacher herself—a decision she made while taking eighth grade history with a Miss Carlton.

“She made me love history,” Matern said. “She made us look at different perspectives … and why each side took the stand that they took.”

That’s an approach Matern brings to Caroline Middle School.

Matern, a Baltimore native and Randolph-Macon College graduate, has taught at CMS for the past seven years, the length of her career. She teaches ACE (All Children Excel) social studies to sixth, seventh, and eighth graders—which means she teaches U.S. history through the Civil War, civics and economics, and world history to 1500 A.D., respectively—and she instructs a general education sixth grade class.

ACE is an advanced-level program that allows for extra enrichment. For example, Matern’s sixth graders recently portrayed a debate between Revolutionary War-era patriots and loyalists—and midway through, the students switched which side they were presenting. That class will also be creating historically themed board games with special dice that will require them to use their mathematical skills as well.

With projects like these, Matern follows the examples of her own teachers who made the subject matter compelling.

“I had some pretty funny teachers in high school that also drew me towards wanting to teach history. I took AP (Advanced Placement) U.S. and Government, but they made it interesting. It wasn’t just that rote memorization,” Matern said.

“I try to do that for my kids, because I don’t want them just sitting there being bored,” she added.

Working with three different grade levels of middle school students, Matern has little chance of becoming bored herself.

“I know everyone’s like, ‘Oh my gosh, how could you teach middle school?’ They really are sweet, and they really mean well.

They don’t always have filters. They don’t always know the correct way to act and things like that, but when they get it, they get it,” Matern said.

“I love my kids. I could one day have a bad day, and the next day, I get a card from someone telling me I’m the best teacher. It’s those little things,” she continued.

High school students don’t typically make any sort of “thank you” cards for teachers, and elementary students might do so at the insistence of their parents, “but they mean it when they do it in middle school,” Matern said.

In fact, a Christmas card she received one year was rather explicit about the matter, as the student wrote, “Mrs. Matern, you’re the best teacher—and I mean it.”

Early on, Matern learned that no two children are alike.

“When you’re in school (learning to teach), they give you the textbook perfect classroom, … and that doesn’t happen,” she said.

She described her first year as “rough,” but she looks back fondly on those students, who are now 20 and 21.

“I still run into some of those kids,” Matern said. “I love to run into them. They’re great kids. But they all come from very different backgrounds. … I’ve taken that with me.”

She continued, “Some kids are going to come from different stations in life, and they need to know that you (the teacher) are that stable person for them sometimes.”

Matern strives to be sensitive to the needs of each unique child. “If a kid doesn’t have a pencil, give them one. You don’t know where they’re coming from. You don’t know if they’re going home to parents at night, or if their parents are at work,” she said.

“I look at them as if they’re my own children, and how would I want my daughter treated?” Matern added.

“Literally every child I’ve ever had is different. Even when I have twins, they’re different.”

As a resident of Caroline County, Matern encounters students frequently throughout the community—and she even met several as younger children when she was a pool manager at Lake Caroline and Ladysmith Village.

“It helps me with my relationship with them, because I live here, too, so I can relate things to them that are going on in our community, and I see them places,” Matern said.

She recalled encountering a group of 13-year-olds behaving rambunctiously out in public last year, and all she “had to do was look at them” to get them to calm down.

“I enjoy that,” Matern said.

Study tip

Matern said she had recently recommended to her students a “flash to trash” method of studying vocabulary flashcards—once students are familiar with the vocabulary word on a particular flashcard, get rid of it and focus on the remaining ones.

“I want them to be thinking higher than just the vocabulary, but if they’re just trying to keep afloat on something, in any class, then the vocabulary is going to help them,” Matern said.

Copyright 2015 Lakeway Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without written permission.
© Lakeway Publishers, Inc. Privacy Policy