Ms. Delmonaco recently received the Sigma Xi Award for outstanding achievement in elementary school science teaching for the year 2001.
By:Al Wicklund
MONROE Margaret Delmonaco, a first-grade teacher at Barclay Brook School, has had 22 six-year-old scientists in her classroom this year.
And, it turns out those young scientists have been sharing that classroom with an award-winning teacher.
Ms. Delmonaco, completing her fourth year as a Barclay Brook teacher this month, recently received the Sigma Xi Award for outstanding achievement in elementary school science teaching for the year 2001.
The award is given by the Rutgers chapter of Sigma Xi, a society of researchers. The chapter annually recognizes an elementary, middle school and high school teacher from the Middlesex-Somerset county area.
Ms. Delmonaco was an economics major at Rutgers University’s Douglas College, where she received her bachelor’s degree. She went on to earn a master’s degree in business from Rider University. Then, she worked in New York City for several years before deciding she wanted to teach.
"I was doing quite well in the business world and I wasn’t unhappy working there, but something was missing," she said.
She said the work was financially rewarding but not fulfilling. So, she decided to go into teaching.
"I’ve never regretted the change. I may miss the better pay at times, but every morning I get up looking forward to school and working with the students and the Barclay Brook staff," Ms. Delmonaco said.
Barclay Brook Principal Carol Schwalje nominated Ms. Delmonaco and the Sigma Xi committee agreed with the nomination, citing the teacher for her "innovative teaching methods and the methods’ positive impact on students’ academic achievement."
Ms. Delmonaco said she’s interested in encouraging the students to ask questions and to learn by doing.
"The children kept journals and recorded changes in the things they were working with. We explained that’s the way scientists learn, by observing their experiments and seeing what works and what doesn’t.
"When we did a segment on weights and using scales, the students were to make a hypothesis, a theory, as to which of several items weighed more. They were told there is no failure involved in the hypothesis, just a matter of discovering what is true," she said.
The first-graders were introduced to many things in the world of the physical sciences, Ms. Delmonaco said.
"They learned about levers. They watched and recorded the growth of such things as grass seeds and radish seeds left on wet sponges. They observed carnations going through their stages of development and learned about evaporation.
"It was a busy year and each student kept his or her own journal recording what they observed and learned," she said.
Last year, Ms. Delmonaco joined other faculty members in re-writing the science curriculum with a greater emphasis on the physical sciences.
She said she began to believe they had improved the curriculum and made it more interesting when students started asking her, "Are we doing science today?"