TEACHER FEATURE: TEACHER USES HANDS-ON METHOD TO MAKE LEARNING FUN

When Rhonda Dunham was in sixth grade, her teacher at Franklin Elementary School made learning so much fun that Dunham decided to follow in her footsteps.

"Unless you teach, it's probably hard to understand, but there's something about looking in those faces every morning and thinking, `I have to teach them something new today. But I have to do it in a way that they'll never forget," she said.

Dunham has been teaching for seven years in the Cape Girardeau School District. This is her first year teaching sixth grade at Jefferson Elementary School.

"Knowing you helped a child achieve a goal at some point in his or her life is a reward that cannot be matched," Dunham said. "I still have students from my first year of teaching that call me to `chat.' I made a difference in a few lives."

Dunham likes to use hands-on activities to teach the students in her classroom. A new science program should be part of the fun, she said.

In one science activity, Dunham built a machine, placed it in a paper bag and when the string was pulled, the machine would hum and then ding.

Students were given a collection of materials to build their own versions but couldn't use Dunham's contraption as a model.

"The results were amazing," she said. "We have every type of workable model you could imagine. And they worked. One student told me privately that it looked sort of like the broken appliance after their father had tried to fix it. It was a real humdinger, too."

This year students will design and build a bridge and tower from straws to test strength and durability, Dunham said.

"What better way to learn than to learn by having fun," she said. "Hands on is the way to go for my class. I don't feel I could be an effective teacher any other way."

Dunham is a graduate of Southeast Missouri State University and is currently working on her master's degree. She has a son, stepdaughter and granddaughter.