We congratulate Leslie Gilman on being names Middletown Public Schools 2010 Teacher of the Year....Read More Here

Please read Leslie's speech that she shared during her Teacher of the Year Celebration:

"Thank you all for coming tonight to help me celebrate being named Middletown Teacher of the Year by my peers.  It is a wonderful honor and tribute to my parents, family and colleagues. 

I was fortunate to have grown up in a family that valued education and the concept of life long learning.  My mother began her career as a special educator in Boston in the 50s.  After raising 5 children to be of school age, she returned to teaching as a first grade teacher in the Fairfax County Public Schools in Virginia.  My father retired as Deputy Commander of Submarines with a rank of Rear Admiral at the age of 52.  He then returned to school to become a high school physics teacher in Arlington, Virginia.  In his few short years as a teacher, he transformed Bishop O’Connell’s physics program from approximately 50 students to more than 3 times that many, computerized the whole school, and designed a new physics wing which was dedicated in his memory.  I have a brother and a sister who are college professors with PhDs.  So you see, I have had great role models in my life.

I always knew I wanted to be a teacher.  Salve was a natural choice for college for me.  I had the best professors and mentors.  I now count many of them as my colleagues since returning to Salve to instruct new teachers entering the field of education.

I thank my husband of nearly 23 years for supporting my efforts.  In the 3 years it took me to complete my master’s degree, we simultaneously completed our family with the births of our 3 children.  I could not have spent so much time in class and at the library without the support of my husband. He continues to support me by making my coffee and my lunch everyday.  Now, our oldest, Michael, is a second year chemical engineering student at UNH and in the middle of exams right now.  Brian will be attending Connecticut College this fall as a member of their swim team; and Ainsley is in the midst of her college search and will graduate from high school next year.  I am truly blessed to have such a wonderful, hard working family.

I want to thank my colleagues for their hard work and dedication to the students of Middletown.  I think I speak for everyone when I say we are fortunate to work in the community of Middletown.  I have always felt supported and needed by parents, colleagues and students alike.  Because of this, I felt comfortable in completing the process for teacher of the year.  Many, many teachers are nominated each year, but very few follow through with the process.  I challenge you all to complete the process when nominated.  It is a journey of reflection.  Whether you choose to pursue the nomination or not, the process of reflecting on your teaching and philosophy of education is a powerful learning tool.  Please considerate it.  There are so many deserving teachers in our district.  The TOY Committee gives of their time and energy to support and enrich the process.  They do this with a great deal of respect and compassion as well.

I would also like to thank the teachers who have welcomed me into their classrooms and allowed me to learn from them and allowed me to put my own two cents into the learning community of their classrooms.  Judy, Christa, Marie, Diane and Anne were willing to take a chance on collaboration.  I know that it has made me a better teacher and I hope that I have been a good example in return.  I want to thank Michelle Fonseca for supporting the idea of collaboration and inclusion.  She is an incredible advocate for students and teachers.

Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to bring to your attention two subjects that I feel are vital to our continued success in education; colleague collaboration and social thinking skills in our students. 

On collaboration, none of us can be truly effective in isolation.  If you have not had the opportunity to work closely with a specialist (and by that I mean a reading specialist, an OT,PT, speech therapist, special educator, art, music, phys. Ed. Teacher or librarian) or even with a colleague within the same grade level or subject area; seek them out.  Plan together, look at student work together, bounce ideas off of each other, consider flexible grouping of your students and offer guidance with a particular issue.  Two heads are better than one.  We all have unique strengths to bring to the table, and by collaborating, we improve our weaknesses—because we all have those too.

 Regarding social thinking skills-- You will not find them in the GLEs or on the NECAP assessment.  However, you will find some of them on the report card in the form of Learner Qualities.  We assess our students on these qualities without ever explicitly teaching them.  We expect students to come to school already possessing these skills.  We know that they don’t.  In light of the recent tragic bullying incidents, I ask us all to incorporate social thinking into every class we teach.  I ask us all to listen carefully to our students and parents.  I ask us all not to stand for any bullying in any form within our classrooms, hallways, cafeterias, playgrounds, game fields, and other social activities.  We have a responsibility to our students and our community to model good citizenship and to empower students to be good citizens.  Speech and Language therapist, Michelle Garcia Winner, defines social thinking as, “our innate ability to think through and apply information to succeed in situations that require social knowledge. Social thinking is a form of intelligence that is key to learning concepts and integrating information across a variety of settings; academic, social, home and community.”   

We teach in difficult times.  The pressure to do more with less and the demands placed on teachers at the state and federal level mean that we must celebrate our accomplishments and successes with our peers and our community to reassure us all that what we do is so meaningful and worthwhile.  I want new and future teachers to see how rewarding this profession is so that we may continue to attract the best and brightest teachers to our community as well as to graduate exceptional students from our schools to go out and represent our community across the country.  I want my peers and the community to see that what we do takes hard work, dedication and constant changing of our craft. 

In closing, I would like to thank you all for coming tonight.  I thank you all for your words of support and congratulations.  I look forward to collaborating with you and to continue to encourage the students of Middletown to become life long learners.   Thank you."