Roy Clark Elementary -  Rebecca King, 2nd Grade/5th Grade

Second grade teacher Rebecca King has been named Roy Clark Elementary Teacher of the Year for 2019-2020. She has been with Union since 2015.  (She started the year as a fifth grade teacher but took over a second grade class as enrollment numbers changed at Roy Clark.)

“Growing up I knew I wanted to be a teacher,” King said.  “When my teachers cleaned out their files at the end of each school year, I always jumped in to take their extra copies home.  I often played school with my stuffed animals.  In elementary school, the special education students were in their own classrooms in our building.  In 5th grade, as a safety patrol, we could volunteer to spend our recess time with these students.  I always enjoyed working in these classrooms. In high school, I changed my mind and thought I wanted to be a speech pathologist.  While I was working on my master’s degree, I missed the classroom and always had ideas geared for teaching a class. I changed my degree plan and was much happier.  Nineteen years later, I still enjoy seeing what children can do.:
    
King’s favorite subject to teach is math.

“I love math because there are so many different ways to get to a solution. Over the years I have heard many students – and their parents – say “They are not good at math and that’s OK because some people just aren’t.”  I want to change the mindset from it is ok to not be good at math to the mindset of everyone can be good at math,” she said. “I believe that everyone can be successful when they are exposed to a variety of strategies and positive messages.  Someone once said, ‘To be a math person, you just have to be a person and do math’.”

King’s education background includes:
•    Bachelors of Science – Speech Pathology – Oklahoma State University (1996)
•    Early Childhood and Elementary Teacher Certification - Texas Woman’s University (1999) ESL Certification (2019)
•    Currently Working on Masters in Teaching, Learning and Leadership with an emphasis in Mathematics Education (Plan to graduate summer 2019) Oklahoma State University