“The teacher every child should have”: How Nicole Erickson makes a difference one child at a time

 

Nicole Erickson

 

Nicole Erickson, Heritage Elementary’s 2024-2025 Teacher of the Year, is the last person to call attention to herself. But those who know her best say that her impact as a teacher is profound.

 

“Nicole really puts the kids as number one,” Principal Lance Robins said. “She forms relationships with them that are not just strategic; they are meaningful! And she sees the best in them, even and especially when others don’t. These kids need Mrs. Erickson. No one else could fill her role. She’s that good, and I don’t know what we would do without her. She’s the teacher every child should have.”

 

As a fourth-grade teacher, Erickson strives to impart curiosity and kindness to her students.

 

“Every morning, we do two things,” she said. “First, there’s a math box activity. I always ask them these two questions: 1. What do you wonder? 2. What do you notice?”

 

Erickson credits those two questions with some of the most important connections that students make throughout the year.

 

“It’s one of my favorite things,” Erickson said. “At the end of the year, they start connecting everything we do. They connect language arts into math. They connect science into math. The connections they make are amazing, and it comes from simply asking them, “What do you wonder, and what do you notice?” It’s just fun to help them see why what they learn is important.”

 

Nicole Erickson and students in classroom

 

Erickson’s students reach for more than academics. After their math boxes, they watch a video about an act of kindness.

 

“My favorite quote is, ‘In a world where you can be anything, be kind,’” Erickson explained. “I push that almost as hard as the academics. We always talk about the idea that one person can make a difference. Does making a difference have to be a big thing? Of course not. It can be a smile. It can be a wave. It could just be the little things that you do to recognize people, to help them feel good, and to be kind. It’s the small and simple things. I teach them, and I hope that it connects. And when I can see that it does, that’s what inspires me to come back.”

 

Erickson’s message spreads beyond the doors of her own classroom. A child from another class proved it when he came to visit her before school.

 

“If I could come to any class,” he said, “it would be this one. I feel kindness here.”