Kohl McCormick Early Childhood Teaching Awards
Bettye Cohns
Pre-School Teacher
Child Care Center of Evanston
Evanston, Illinois
Helping children means helping their parents -- that maxim could be the motto of award winner Bettye Cohns. After 27 years of early childhood teaching, Cohns, who teaches three to five year olds at the nationally accredited Child Care Center of Evanston, believes taking care of her children also means being attentive to the needs of parents. That's why she spends almost as much time in extracurricular activities for parents as she does in developing curriculum for her eager young students. Cohns believes that a quality early childhood program is an interactive one, so she readily invites parents to be a part of the class activities.
Parents frequently drop by for breakfast or lunch with the children, and often stay to share materials or facilitate classroom activities. But the student/teacher/parent interface doesn't end there. Cohns also devotes several evenings a week to co-chair a parent support group, helping anxious parents stay on top of everything from their child's development to job- and family-related stress. She also helps organize social events, like theater outings, to attend to their needs for quality social interaction. "I believe that when parents feel good about themselves," Cohns says, "their children can be successful."
But clearly children are the most direct beneficiaries of Cohns's good nature and solid expertise. Administrators and colleagues say she carefully considers each child's interests and developmental level in lesson planning, frequently creating her own handmade games and books for each lesson. One parent gleefully recalls that her four-year-old daughter still "tells people about the lemonade stand her class made, how the lemonade tasted, how it was prepared and how much money they made."
That real-life experience helped teach the children to count, distinguish between a quarter, dime and nickel, and "how to make a great glass of lemonade." Cohns additional strengths are her emphasis on good character and her embrace of diversity. Since 1998 she has helped initiate both programs at the Center, by becoming a certified Character Counts! trainer, and by developing anti-bias curriculum for herself and other teachers. Perhaps the highest compliment of her teaching comes from a colleague who says: "I bestow upon her the highest praise I could give any colleague, which is I would love to have her teach my children."