Golden Apple Award: Kim Lockery, Nolan Elementary
SIGNAL MOUNTAIN, TN (WDEF) – Recognizing each child’s unique strengths *and* challenges is crucial to helping them become the best students they can be. Kim Lockery does that every day, with a smile. He classroom might be the coziest place at Nolan Elementary.
Ashley Aldridge Wilson is the Principal at Nolan.
She says, “Ms. Lockery is a gift for children. She comes in every day with joy. She is so prepared. She mentors other teachers. She serves on our leadership team. During Covid, she rose up and did all of the at home learning for second grade. She is just a leader among her peers.”
When asked to describe herself, Mrs. Lockery says, “I mean, outside of teaching, I am a mom and I have been married going, this would be the 20th year in July. I have a son, Jackson and then I have a daughter McKenzie. I teach because I had some great teachers growing up, specifically my first grade teacher, and second grade teacher. Actually, when I started teaching at Nolan, they were both still teaching, and because I have an older brother that had some challenges maybe in school growing up, and I can tell, you know, years that he had vested in him, and took the time to get to know him, that it made a world of difference in his life the lives of my family members.”
Students say, “She teaches us great things that we don’t know about already.”
“She teaches me something new every day and I like how sweet she is.”
“She teaches me something every day, and she wants to go on games learn.”
“She’s a good teacher and she’s really nice.”
Mrs. Lockery continues, “I want them to remember, you never know what a day is going to bring. It’s always different. I laugh every day. I learn something new every day, whether it’s subject material that I’m teaching, or just something new about my students.”
She concludes, “I want them to remember that I cared about them. That I showed up every day, and I hope that helped them smile and make a difference in their day as you know. I hope they do, you know, learn the subject material, but more importantly, I hope that they’ve learned that they’re important and that I really care about them.”
