Number Sense And Numeration

Gernes found a simple reward works wonders

John Gernes, who considers New London, Minn., his hometown, saw a lot of life before his family settled there when he was in fifth grade.

“I call that home,” said Gernes who up to that point had moved around a lot because of his father’s job as a fisheries biologist. He lived from Sitka, Alaska to Selma, Ala., during the civil rights marches which he remembers vividly.

Within a year of starting school in New London, his life story may very well have been written.

“I didn’t know it at the time,” said Gernes regarding the question about when he decided teaching was going to be his career. “I was in sixth grade and I can remember thinking I would do that different (from the way the teacher did it).”

He went to college planning to be a veterinarian, but acknowledges college chemistry was a roadblock on that path. Gernes took a semester off during which time he went to work for an industrial wood finishing business.

“There was no way I wanted to do that for a living,” said Gernes who returned to college. It was later, during a J-Term in San Diego, that Gernes recalled the sixth-grade incident. “It was kind of like a light bulb moment.”

He returned to his classes at St. John’s University and began studying education, which is where he met Sharon who would become his wife. She was attending the College of St. Benedict. At the time St. John’s was an all-male school and St. Benedict’s was an all-female school, however students from the two campuses shared classes.

When Gernes graduated mid-year in 1977, he took a position at St. Mary’s Cathedral Elementary School in St. Cloud, Minn. In 1979 he applied for a position to teach sixth grade at the Hudson Middle School. Bill Hickox, administrator, and Jerry Donatell, a fellow teacher, both contributed to Gernes realizing that for him teaching was a calling, not just a job.

This started a career with the Hudson School District which has spanned 32 years and found Gernes teaching nearly every subject. He started team teaching with Becky Lee for four years at the middle school. The he taught fifth grade for four years at Fourth Street School which included science, social studies, language arts and math, after which he returned to the middle school and resumed teaching with Lee until she retired in 2009.

“Over the years I did it all,” said Gernes, who moved to the new middle school, teaching both math and language arts until a curriculum change in 2009 since which he has taught math alone.

Ms. Garcia's Learning Blog!: Number Sense and Numeration ...

Hello! My name is Sonya Garcia and I am currently working towards completing my Bachelor of Education at Niagara University in Ontario. The purpose of education is to help enrich children's lives so that they can succeed in whatever endeavors they may select in their journey through life. As an educator, my role will be to motivate, encourage and develop my students potential so that they can obtain excellence in everything that they do. Children are our future and I have been given one of the greatest opportunities to help make a difference in shaping who they will become.

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