A Teacher Story For the Ages - “Elaine’s Circle”

From Teacher Stories by Teacher Stories

December 1, 2024 · 51 min

About this episode

Bob Katz shares the inspiring story of Elaine Moore, a dedicated teacher who fostered a strong community in her classroom while supporting a student with a terminal illness.

Author Bob Katz shares the extraordinary story of a gifted 4th-grade teacher named Elaine Moore, the central character of his book Elaine’s Circle: A Teacher, a Student, a Classroom, and One Unforgettable Year. One reviewer writes, “There are books that you read that stay with you all your life—Elaine’s Circle will be one of them.” If you’d like a chance to receive a free, signed copy of Elaine’s Circle, go to www.teacherstories.org. In this episode, Katz explains how Moore managed to rally her class, her school, and the whole community around Seamus Farrell, one of her students who developed a terminal illness. We also get a glimpse of Elaine’s unique perspectives on teaching and education. “Elaine's abiding theory of education,” Katz says, “is that the classroom is a community…Caring about classmates and belonging to the group was precisely the behavior Elaine had been cultivating beyond the math, the reading, the science, the grammar. Elaine wanted her students to experience the sharing, and the intimacy, and the trust that can develop in a group. She wanted them to understand that the learning they struggled so hard to achieve had a purpose, and the purpose was to help not…

People in this episode

Guest: Bob Katz

Topics covered

education
teaching
community
student support

Keywords

Elaine's Circle
4th-grade teacher
Seamus Farrell
community in education

Mentioned in this episode

Products: Elaine's Circle

Books & works: A Teacher Story For the Ages, Elaine’s Circle, Elaine’s Circle: A Teacher, a Student, a Classroom, and One Unforgettable Year, Nobel, Pulitzer, Oscar