Name: Sharon Farley.

Residence: Waynesville

Family: Husband, Jiles Farley, Wayne Local School Board Member; daughter, Cathy, a kindergarten teacher at Waynesville Elementary; son, Michael, a teacher, football and basketball coach and a daughter-in-law, Katie, who teaches 4th grade math.

Education: Bachelor's degree from Eastern Kentucky University; two master's degrees from Wright State University.

Work Experience: Farley has taught at Waynesville Elementary for 34 years.

Why do you teach? "Through positive role models when I was a student at Waynesville School."

Teaching philosophy: "My teaching philosophy is to create an enriching, stimulating and supportive learning environment in which all learners can achieve success. Consequently, the children participate in monthly themes that are multi-leveled, multi-disciplined (integration of several subject areas -- art, math, reading, science and social studies), and multi-sensory. The children work in collaboration with each other serving in roles as peer support for developing learners and/or as peer recorders as various tasks are completed in centers."

What makes your classroom unique?: "A supportive learning environment focuses on children's learning styles while challenging children to higher order thinking skills as modeled during whole group instruction and supported during small group instruction."

"A strong and consistent intervention program includes the support of 23 fifth-grade students who evaluate reading fluency three times a week with our multi-leveled reading program, a parent intervention group which meets three times a week, and with former students from second-grade who check the first-graders on vocabulary words."

Inspiration: "As a student of Waynesville school, I found my teachers to be very supportive and sensitive to my learning needs. My parents, also, held great admiration and respect for teachers."

Professional goals? "My goal is realizing that I am a learner. Education and teaching are more exciting to me today than ever before. Teaching children how to think independently and challenging them in critical and higher order thinking skills have become an exciting adventure for me. I spend a lot of time looking at educational resources ranging from textbooks and teaching manuals to web sites."

Personal interests: "I enjoy my family, friends, school environment, church and community. I also have a 10 pound miniature Dachshund that has won my heart. I enjoy visiting historical sites. Most of all, I enjoy creating curriculum and testing that curriculum on my students."

Classroom success story: "Last year, I had a student who had great difficulty with reading. Several months into the school year, that student read a sentence. I led the class in a cheer. But, I was deeply touched that the class was genuinely thrilled for this child."

"A few weeks later, that same student read a paragraph. Without any prompting, the class rejoiced with that student. This student's self esteem soared. Today, he is on level reading in second grade."

"The children reward me every day when they come to school excited about learning. As they discover the principles of magnetism and static electricity or open an egg to reveal an oviparous animal and the eggs that animal laid, I am deeply touched when they say, 'I love these activities.'"