Dividing numbers and spelling words aren’t the only lessons Plantation Key School teacher Monica Horsley teaches her students.
“I’m a person who believes learning and education continue throughout your whole life,” she said. “Learning about life makes students better people in society and in the world.”
Originally from Richmond, Virginia, the fourth-grade teacher of eight years bid farewell to the traditional teacher’s role when her students departed for spring break last year. A week or so later, Horsley embarked on the adventure of virtual instruction.
Not only did the job itself change, but so did the questions Horsley asked herself each day.
“Yes, I was teaching from home using Google,” she said. “But I was also asking myself, ‘Are my kids truly OK? Do they need something emotionally and not just academically? We were delivering food to them and making sure they had everything.”
Horsley remembers the moment her mask-clad students returned to the classroom in person after spending the first four weeks of the 2020-21 school year learning online. They were divided between the classroom and the gymnasium to ensure safe distancing, but at least they were on campus.
“I literally had tears in my eyes as the kids were coming through that door,” she recalled.
Horsley recently earned the Monroe County School District’s Teacher of the Year honor for her enthusiasm, intriguing lesson plans and differentiated instruction to accommodate students’ different needs.
“It was surreal. I burst into tears,” Horsley said of the honor. “I didn’t have any expectations of that.”
Her influence reaches farther than the classroom, PKS Principal Lisa Taylor said. She instills in her students a desire to learn and thrive, and her commitment to them inspires and supports her fellow teachers.
Horsley and others are still teaching in the classroom and on Google to accommodate quarantine requirements.
“It’s still not normal, but the kids are doing great,” she said. And that’s what matters.
