School of Education and Human Resources

Office of School and Field Services

381 Pawley Hall Rochester, Michigan 48309 - 4494

248-370-3083

December 17, 2012 To Whom It May Concern, Peggy Sherry is a calm, warm, caring person who has a heart for children. It has been my privilege to be her supervisor for her student teaching. As a good listener, she is able to put together information in ways that is helpful for making changes. This also helps her to build good relationships. She presents lessons that help students connect with real-life experiences. Her creativity peaks their interest. Individualized attention has helped children make good progress. Involvement outside the classroom was important to Peggy. Before school started, she worked with teachers on their school improvement plans. She attended a social event, a dinner out, and a Welcome Back event for staff. During the Curriculum Night and Ice Cream Social, she introduced herself and talked with parents. She volunteered to help fourth grade students after school to enhance their peer responses, narrative, and compare and contract writing knowledge in preparation for the MEAP, and was amazed at the growth in just a few short weeks. She attended planning sessions for the 3rd-5th grade MEAP. The third grade team meeting was a regular part of each week. Her leadership with the social studies unit for the entire third grade proved to give all students in the grade level a much richer experience with letters to Michigan business and sharing between the classes as a culminating activity. Through the past year, Peggy has picked up so many tools for classroom management. She effectively used the behavior chart. To help with following the rules, she kept a tally of the behavior students were trying to eliminate. She learned to ask for what she wanted, expected it, and reinforced the behavior. Students became well trained in these first two months of school. Lesson planning was completed with great care to include technology, activities for students to help them connect with the core standard, and used as many multiple intelligences as appropriate in the lesson. Many resources were used including textbooks, Internet resources, worksheets, props, and teacher examples. Various graphic organizers were introduced to help students remember concepts. While I observed Peggy, interesting lessons were shared. For capacity in math, students compared various sizes beginning with a gallon, four quarts, eight pints, and sixteen cups. They made gallon girls and guys. A social studies lesson on Michigan products and natural resources talked about the resources needed for each product and charted them in their Michigan notebooks following many examples. A grammar lesson on adjectives used a story called Hairy, Scary, Ordinary and various hats for the students to describe. They made their own hats and described them in sentences. During a math lesson with technology, students learned to make bar graphs

starting with transportation to school. Students gathered data and made the graphs. In a reading lesson, students were introduced to cause and effect with examples of things that happen in the school followed by examples from their read-aloud, Winn Dixie. Following a story shared on Tumble Books on the computer, A Camping Spree with Mr. Magee, students talked about the different causes and effects, then completed a chart with examples from the story. During the five weeks Peggy spent student teaching in New Zealand at Sunnyvale Primary School with 6 and 7 year olds, she really blossomed. She returned with a rich knowledge of ways to individualize instruction. She was in a class with a challenging group of students and a teacher who was very firm and used routines. She was able to step in and use this method well. She responded to feedback immediately, asked questions, and reflected deeply. She showed all the traits of a truly professional educator. Her craft of teaching was refined with this international experience. I highly recommend Peggy Sherry for a teaching job in an elementary or middle school. She will be a wonderful addition to a staff because she takes initiative to do what is right for children. As a team player, she gets involved beyond her classroom. Her analysis of data will be helpful on the school improvement team. Please contact me at 810-305-8716 or hiller@oakland.edu if you would like to talk with me. Sincerely,

Sharon Hiller, Ed.D. Director of School and Field Services