November 17, 2006

EvergreenTeacher of the Month

Charlotte Perez of Norwood Creek Elementary

Learning can be fun and rewarding

By Carol Rosen
Staff Writer

It’s not often that an eighth grader fondly remembers his fourth grade teacher or takes the time to nominate her as teacher of the month. But that’s exactly what Nhat-Dang “Danny” Do has done.

Charlotte Perez and her class of fourth graders watches a video on plants and insects. The class gets to watch a video every other Thursday before lunch.

“She's really a great person. Mrs. Perez should be teacher of the month because she's dedicated so much of her life for her students. She not only taught me how to be successful in life, she also taught me how to be a good person,” Do wrote in an e-mail to the Times, nominating Perez for Teacher of the Month.

“Back in fourth grade, on every Wednesday, Mrs. Perez would have a time where all the kids would sit in a circle and share their feelings. That really made us care for one another and helped shape us to be good people. The one thing I'll always remember in her class was when I told her about my dream to be the President of the United States, and she told me ‘Dang, you can be anything you want to be, as long as you work hard.’ That's always has helped me to work hard and to succeed. Mrs. Perez really deserves being teacher of the month,” he added.

Perez was happy about the gesture, but not necessarily surprised.

“I really love my kids,” she said, explaining that among her special skills is a philosophy that includes respect. “I respect my students and in turn, they respect me. They know what I want from them and they also know that I care about them.”

Perez suffers from degenerative arthritis in her back. She spends her days working on a special scooter that allows her to “speak to them eye-to-eye, which is a benefit.”

It’s evident that she likes and considers each of her students special. She treats them as she would her own children providing them with limits and directions.

“I’m teaching them independence and confidence,” she said. “I encourage them to take a risk because that gives them the courage and confidence to go through life.”

Her class is not about seatwork, although there is some of that, but she uses learning to help teach her students new things while also providing them the opportunities to be independent, confident and to take risks. She enjoys asking them questions, but at the same time, helps them develop the talent to ask questions, as well as how to use words along with the social graces.

“They know where they stand with me,” she said. “They also know that their grades come from their work. They also seem to have a lot more confidence when they leave my classroom [than when they came in].”

Perez teaches a multi-subject class that includes math, reading, science, language arts, social studies and art.

“We’re fortunate to have an art docent that comes in. I’m also lucky because I minored in art in college. Art is very important to children, many children need to produce a product” to feel a sense of accomplishment, she said.

Perez was born in Mannheim, Germany. She immigrated to the United States with her parents at the age of seven.

She spoke no English but manages to speak it perfectly today with no accent.

Her parents first moved to Alum Rock in San Jose and bought their first house in Milpitas. She attended Joseph Weller and Spangler Elementary Schools and was in the first graduating class of Thomas Russell Junior High. She attended Samuel Ayer for her freshman year of high school, before graduating from Mission High in Fremont. She has a Bachelor’s of Art degree from San Jose State University and her teaching credential from National University.

Bryan Nguyen and Perez go over some of his duties for the week. Nguyen got to spend the week of Nov. 13 as star student and special assistant. Photos by Carol Rosen

She’s been married to Joe Perez for 35 years—she met him in college—and has two grown children who both work at Apple Computer.

While teaching is her first love—she has wanted to be a teacher since she was 8—she has had quite a number of jobs, including owning Perez & Company Florists from 1982-92. She also taught an industrial management program at Evergreen Valley College for four years as well as pre-school, Kindergarten, high-risk high school students and specialty classes in adult education.

This is her 10th year teaching fourth grade at Norwood Creek.

“I really like the school, it’s a great mix,” she said. “We have veteran teachers with lots of wisdom and young teachers with lots of enthusiasm.”

She especially likes the fourth grade because “the kids are savvy enough to get the jokes but still innocent enough to show the joy that little kids have in living.”

Teaching them allows her the “opportunity to enlighten them and open their eyes to how great life is. By the time they finish fourth grade, they have grown by leaps and bounds and could run the class,” she added.

She obviously lends her imagination and enthusiasm to her students and they eat it up. Among the ‘perks’ in her classroom is money. Her classroom has its own monetary system called Perez Pesos, which the students receive for doing jobs. The pesos can be used for book sales and snacks. But more important, the currency helps the kids learn how to handle money.

“Their first question is always can I make change, providing them a practical lesson in life,” she said.

Another example of her imagination is her book reports. Recently, students were asked to do a book report as a puzzle. They were told they could give the book up to five stars, draw pictures of the characters and then turn it into a puzzle. They exchanged the puzzles with friends who had to put them together.

“They really had fun with it,” she said. “They were learning about the books, what they liked and why they liked it and it encourages them to read, especially books that their peers enjoy.”

In Europe, she said, teachers are really looked up to. In fact, she said that her cousin is a doctor and that “his professors were upset with him because they wanted him to be a teacher.”

“It would make my dad so proud that I am a teacher,” she said.