Pat Shoemaker lights up when she tells this story.

When she was involved in early work that Apple Computers did with children and computers, in a summer camp she and another teacher spent two days teaching kids the computing tools at hand and then “let them go.” As the kids worked, she says, “I saw a 17-year-old boy get up and go across the room and ask a seven-year-old girl, ‘How did you make that frog jump across those logs?’”

From pre-schoolers to graduate students, she says, “If you can give students a task that’s immediately applicable in their lives, they become a learning community. They become resources for each other.” By providing a task-oriented environment, teachers can tap into students’ natural hunger to learn.

This is one of the things she learned “by watching kids and teachers” early in her career, says Shoemaker, now assistant dean for field experience programs in the College of Education and Human Development. She taught children a total of 17 years, first as a music specialist and in gifted education, then teaching emotionally disturbed children. In one school, where she taught for 13 years, she literally watched kids grow up from early childhood classes through grade six.

“I teach my [teacher preparation] students that they must be good observers,” says Shoemaker. “They need good information to understand problems and apply strategies that will work.”

Persistence in trying to make things work is a foundation piece in Shoemaker’s character, evident in the unswerving passion and energy she devotes to education, even under such discouraging circumstances as funding cuts, the pressures of standardized tests, bureaucracy and the slow pace of systemic progress.

She can think of two factors that contribute to her tendency to push forward.

“My father always said, ‘You can blame everyone else, or you can do something about it.’”

Then there’s what she calls “understanding your sphere of influence,” which she learned very early in her career. “You have to be able to evaluate when you need to expand your sphere of influence and decide whether you’re willing to make the sacrifices necessary to do it.”

Shoemaker talks about what educators call “cognitive complexity” — continually coming up with another way to solve a problem. She remembers watching a professor do a mock interview with a student in the role of a prospective teacher. The professor described to the applicant a situation in which a student had been failing to turn in homework for a month or so. “What would you do in this situation?” he asked. She came up with a reasonable solution. “Okay,” the professor said, “you’ve done this, and the problem continues. What do you do?” She came up with another solution. Over and over, says Shoemaker, the professor extended the problem and asked for more. “Every time, she came up with another solution. This is what teaching requires.”

It also requires the involvement of many people, including parents, teachers, specialists and others. “We need to bring a variety of resources to help children,” says Shoemaker. “And it takes a great deal of patience.”

Shoemaker believes teachers really do want to “reach and teach every child.” Her students know that will be their biggest challenge. “But they believe in themselves,” she says. “I help them to understand how to seek that end and what the pitfalls are that can prevent it — and I show them that they have natural tools they can build on.”

— Kathie Dickenson