{"id":11720,"date":"2024-01-22T11:09:24","date_gmt":"2024-01-22T16:09:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/?p=11720"},"modified":"2024-01-22T11:10:19","modified_gmt":"2024-01-22T16:10:19","slug":"toy-finalist-catherine-gadzinski-inspiring-students-with-an-open-approach-to-expression","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/toy-finalist-catherine-gadzinski-inspiring-students-with-an-open-approach-to-expression\/","title":{"rendered":"Teacher of the Year finalist Catherine Gadzinski: Inspiring students with an open approach to expression"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Old Donation School art teacher Catherine Gadzinski is a finalist for citywide Teacher of the Year.<\/p>\n

Gadzinski is inspired by her mother who is an educator, her father who taught her about patience, and her husband who has taught her about communication. Although her father passed away at the beginning of her teaching career, her memories of him and her mother and husband continue to motivate her to do the best she can for her students every day.<\/p>\n

She tells her students \u201cYou are not the best artist you will ever be at the age of 12; you will continue to grow the more that you practice. And my job is to help you and teach you. I never expect perfection, but I do expect you to grow.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Old Donation eighth grader Sophia Shields said she loves how Gadzinski cherishes her students.<\/p>\n

\u201cHer little messages here and there brighten our days,\u201d Sophia said. \u201cMy favorite phrase that she tells us is, \u2018I appreciate you.\u2019 I appreciate you. She says it with actual sincerity and kindness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sophia is also impressed with her teacher\u2019s commitment to her community, including advising the Old Donation School chapter of the National Junior Honor Society. Gadzinski is the vice president of the Tidewater Virginia Art Educators Association, serves on the VBCPS Gifted Visual Arts Review Committee, paints murals and volunteers for the ViBe Creative District, and leads United Way and other service projects at Old Donation School.<\/p>\n

Gadzinski\u2019s six years of teaching experience have all been with Virginia Beach City Public Schools. She previously taught at Pembroke Elementary.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe has proven herself to be a tremendous teacher and instructional leader at Old Donation School,\u201d said Joel Guldenschuh, principal. \u201cFrom facilitating engaging lessons that allow art students to make cross\u00adcurricular connections to providing professional development to our staff, she has made a positive impact on all stakeholders.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gadzinski believes strongly in social and emotional learning. She asks students to write about how they are feeling, and she writes hand-written notes in response.<\/p>\n

Each year, she is inspired by recent art exhibits she\u2019s visited or important conversations she had with colleagues.<\/p>\n

\u201cI also like to leave the project open to student individuality and expression,\u201d she said. \u201cIf a student wants to change the way they create or present an idea, I try to make it work with whatever materials we have available and align it with the objectives of the project. I encourage them to take the risk and challenge themselves to try something new.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cStudents are always faced with various obstacles, but one thing that can be a constant in their lives is a teacher showing respect, appreciation, compassion, and a willingness to go above and beyond to teach new knowledge,\u201d she said. \u201cThese are things our students can remember and continue to pass on to each other and generations to come.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Old Donation School art teacher Catherine Gadzinski is a finalist for citywide Teacher of the Year. Gadzinski is inspired by her mother who is an educator, her father who taught […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":11721,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11720","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11720","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11720"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11720\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11726,"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11720\/revisions\/11726"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11720"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11720"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vbcpsblogs.com\/core\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11720"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}