Debbie Gathmann
Former Principal of Private School (24 years) Owner of childcare Center 14 years, Kingfisher Academy--recently retired

Candidate Statement

I have worked with staff in several different environments, including training with Carroll and DeKalb Techs for childcare workers. I also do consulting for various private elementary programs as well as several childcare centers in Metro Atlanta. I have a strong mission statement with regards to what I want to see in a school—I think people that work in caretaking positions with kids should spend time thinking about what they believe and how they want to act upon those beliefs in their day to day work. That makes lesson planning easier, because the teacher knows the objectives for the lesson and how she/he intends to put those across. For me, active, tactile learning is important for little kids and still extremely important in learning the basics (reading, math, science) in elementary. Kids learn more playing with a tub of water and various objects for pouring and floating than by listening to someone tell them about water or looking at water lessons on a computer. I like to help students articulate what they discovered during water play—articulating their discoveries help cement facts into their minds to get ready for more advanced work. When I hired someone in the past, I always asked about their sense of humor—kids can test us every day and keeping a sense of humor helps a lot. I wrote curriculum for the YWCA for use in all the childcare centers they operated and found that training a diverse staff took lots of care.

Bio

I have taught for over 40 years—everywhere from an in-home childcare center all the way to working with aspiring teachers at college level. I majored in British Infant schooling through Georgia State (back when you could create your own master’s program) and I’ve very interested in the Reggio approach. I wrote the curriculum books still used at the two remaining YWCA childcare centers and did teacher training for the YWCA for 3 years. After that, I collaborated with some colleagues and we created Kingfisher Academy, which started in East Atlanta and moved eventually to Tucker, GA. I have written grants; I have trained CCC’s on the Childcare Food Program; I have worked with the Extension Agency in training infant care workers. I was the district chair for Girl Scouts in Carroll County. I taught science at Kingfisher and organized hundreds of field trips with informal educators—Audubon, Sierra Club, the Zoo, etc. I believe so strongly in really getting physical to learn—if kids can touch it, they get interested. I worry that we don’t recognize the need for kids to run and touch and laugh and shout out answers. I live in Clarkston with 2 dogs/7 chickens.