Schools

Chalkbeat - Jeromy Payne’s forebears grew crops in Senatobia, Mississippi, so he always had a link to the land.Now Payne is using that ancestral connection to teach reading to third graders at John P. Freeman Optional School in Memphis.

The 30-year-old English Language Arts and social studies teacher accomplishes that through project-based learning, or PBL. That means his students develop projects dealing with real-world problems that relate to their studies. Payne’s students read “The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind,” about a Malawian boy who built a windmill to bring electricity to his village. Electricity enabled his family to pump water to irrigate their farm and end a famine. The book also emphasizes the importance of farming.

The assignment led Payne, who holds a degree in social work from the University of Mississippi and began his career as an education assistant, to help his students develop a farmer’s market. That way, they could see how food is grown — and bring life to the reading lesson.  His work recently earned him the John Larmer Lifelong Learning Award from PBLWorks, a Baltimore-based organization that recognizes teachers for exceptional work in project-based learning.