Jen Kelly is a first grade teacher at Norris Elementary School who has been teaching for 20 years, including 18 years in East Hartford. She believes and models that learning can be fun, while maintaining structure and high expectations for her students.
“She is an extraordinary teacher,” said Norris Principal Corrie Schram. “She is a teacher who recognizes the importance of maximizing the time that she has with her students. That starts from the minute the students walk in. They are learning, they are engaged, all the way up until the minute they pack up and leave to go home.”
Principal Schram says students respond well to Mrs. Kelly’s use of movement, music, small group work, and partner work in her classroom.
“She is a teacher who always gets the results. She is urgent. She is prepared. Every day she's looking for a new strategy to support students to get them to where they need to be,” said Schram.
Learn more about Jen Kelly in the Q&A below.
How long have you been a teacher and how long have you been at Norris School?
Kelly: I've been teaching for 20 years. I began teaching in New Haven, Connecticut, and then I also taught in London, England for a year. Then, when my husband and I decided to spend our life here in America, I landed at East Hartford Public Schools. That was about 18 years ago, and I've been here ever since.
I've been in three schools. I've been at Mayberry, I've been at Hockanum, and I've been here now longest at Norris. I've done every grade level, bar fourth, and most of my career now has been as a first grade teacher. I also spent many years in kindergarten, as well.
Having taught many different grade levels, what do you enjoy about teaching first grade specifically?
Kelly: Our days are fun. Our days are filled with music and movement. I try to incorporate a lot of music and movement into my teaching because I feel that that's one way that children can learn best.
When they come to [first grade], they know their letters, they know their sounds, and they've learned these basic skills. But now we have to take them to that next rung on the ladder, if you will. And it is a big jump because now they have to learn to read more complex text, they have to learn to read and write sentences, multiple sentences, spelling words correctly. So, it's a big jump going from K into 1, but I think that's part of what makes it so exciting. The growth you see from the beginning of first grade to the end, it's just night and day. You really see the kids become learners and ready to learn.
What would someone see if they were to observe your classroom?
Kelly: I sometimes say we're organized chaos. But I am very structured, and I like the students to be very structured. My goal is to, you know, help my students become the best that they can be. I look at school as a dress rehearsal for life, and I feel that the students are here to amass as much knowledge as they can and to make connections between that knowledge, so that as they move forth, they're confident and successful in anything that they do.
What do you love most about your job?
Kelly: I love the students. I couldn’t do this if it wasn’t for the kids. There's something new every day. The scenery always changes. We never know what's going to happen. And I just absolutely adore that spark that you can kind of see in their eyes when they learn something new. And that moment of, “Wow, I really get this now,” or “Wow, I can do this.”
What keeps you going and motivated 20 years into your teaching career?
Kelly: The kids keep me going, most of all. And fun, I’m still having fun. I always think of it as, if I'm not having fun, then the kids aren't having fun, right? If I'm bored, they're bored. And I kind of let that guide my teaching. So perhaps I put a lesson together and I think it's going to be great. And then as I'm teaching it, in my mind, I’m like, “Wow, this is a little boring.” And so, I have to switch it up. I think that's something that keeps me going as a teacher. I have to always be thinking on my toes and thinking about the best way to present content to children, so that they're engaged and willing and wanting to learn.
When I think of all the years that I've done this and all the students that I've taught, I feel like the most important thing is I'm giving them little kernels of knowledge. And they can take these kernels of knowledge and these kernels of learning forward. And if somehow what they learned with me in first grade resonates, that it comes back to them when they're older, then I feel like I've done my job.