Craig Montessori School teacher Kericka Green doesn’t use the word “hope” to describe her students’ academic performance – she has no doubt in her mind that her students will thrive.
“If I said ‘I hope you did your work today,’ that’s a choice. That’s kind of optional,” Green said. “I know they’re going to succeed. It’s a given.”
Green has taught grades one to three at Craig Montessori School, located at 7667 W. Congress St. on the Northwest Side, for the past three years. She was recognized as a teacher of the month in February by the Milwaukee Bucks.
The recognition comes with a $1,000 award for teachers to use in their classrooms.
Raised in the city, Green is a Milwaukee Public Schools graduate. As a mother and teacher, she feels a strong desire to help and protect her students.
“It’s my community. You want to see them succeed, you want them to be somebody, you want them to grow. And I see that in all the children,” she said.
Mother to teacher
Green remembers seeing her strengths to become an educator shine through when she helped her son’s 3-year-old classmate spell “mom’”at Craig Montessori School.
“I saw this child in distress … he just wanted to prepare the word ‘mom’ so bad before his mother got there,” she said. “I sat with this child and we went through the ‘mm’ ‘ah’ ‘ooh’ ‘eh’ over and over again until he got it right.”
She often supported her son and his teacher, Dana Gagnon Hubka, inside and outside the classroom before she became a teacher. Gagnon Hubka, who is now an assistant principal at Riley Dual Language Montessori, quickly noticed traits of a potential teacher in Green.
“It was really evident and clear to me then that Kericka had just this rare set of passionate qualities about her that really lended itself to Montessori,” Gagnon Hubka said. “Her patience, her kindness, her understanding … were just these incredible attributes about her that led her to her success today.”
Gagnon Hubka said the district supports Montessori teachers by offering training and mentorship. When she saw Green’s personality naturally fit with Montessori education, she pushed Green to take the opportunity.
“She took that opportunity and she’s done it all herself. Just incredible,” Gagnon Hubka said.
‘My reward is their test results’
At Craig Montessori, students will typically stay in Green’s classroom from first to third grade.
She’s often teaching some students addition, subtraction or multiplication while teaching other children two-step algebra.
While most students work on their assignments for the day, Green pulls up five children at a time to teach her lesson. She tries to teach in a way that encourages critical thinking and concepts that come naturally to students.
“We get a hook on our lessons, which is really nice, and then we let them come to their conclusion about that lesson,” Green said.
She gets joy out of challenging her students and watching how they succeed and develop a love for learning.
“My reward is their test results,” Green said. “That’s the satisfaction I get, you know? They like the challenging work.”
In Montessori education, teachers “follow the child” regardless of a student’s background. It requires knowing each of the children, who are often at different points in their education.
While traditional education is more structured, Green said Montessori education gives children more freedom to choose what they want to work on within the scope of curriculum requirements.
“We set some structure and they know what’s required,” Green said. “They know what their strengths are, they know what their weaknesses are. I’m a reminder to make sure they stay in the scope.”
A family legacy of teachers
Green said she grew up around a family full of educators. All of her mother’s siblings served as special education teachers.
“Growing up, all I heard was the stories,” Green said. “‘This child was this, and what does your child do?’ And then they get ideas and they bounce ideas off of each other.”
Green’s uncle, Kevin Curry, said his niece has really taken after her aunt, Curry’s sister, who was also a special education teacher.
Curry remembers Green watching her aunt work with children during the summers and taking in techniques for helping students who needed an extra push.
Last summer, Green sent Curry a video of a teaching example and he immediately saw Green’s aunt’s compassion shine through her.
“It’s the passion she had in her delivery and wanting those kids to really succeed,” Curry said. “When I was watching, those kids were trying to leap off the chair to meet those expectations.”
Curry said Green is a take-charge person who’s always going above and beyond.
“She’s a vibrant kind of person,” Curry said.
Alex Klaus is the education solutions reporter for the Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service and a corps member of Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues and communities. Report for America plays no role in editorial decisions in the NNS newsroom.
Jonathan Aguilar is a visual journalist at Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service who is supported through a partnership between CatchLight Local and Report for America.
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