Chris Blake is the district’s middle school teacher of the year
April 6, 2011
By Sebastian Moraga
Chris Blake (back row, center), posing with some of his ‘fellow sixth-graders,’ recently won the Snoqualmie Valley Schools Foundation’s Middle School Educator of the Year award. By Sebastian Moraga
Chris Blake spends at least eight hours a day in the wrong building. And he loves it.
“Originally, I was going to be a fourth-grade school teacher,” the Chief Kanim Middle School science and math teacher said. “No way I would ever try middle school.”
That was Blake’s mindset 15 years ago. Since then, he has taught nothing but sixth grade.
Back then, he heard of a school in Fall City looking for a sixth-grade teacher. To Blake, that was his practice interview. Instead, it turned out to be the only job he has ever held since graduating from Whitworth College in Spokane.
“This is my grade,” the Snoqualmie Valley Schools Foundation’s Middle School Teacher of the Year said. “This is my dream job.”
At a school like Chief Kanim, middle school starts in the sixth grade, so students are nervous, excited and they still love their teacher, Blake said.
Nevertheless, middle school is challenging for children.
“They are going through the hormones, growing and changing, just trying to find out who they are,” Blake said. “It’s tough.”
It’s challenging for teachers, too, he said.
“Those seventh- and eighth-grade teachers,” Blake said. “Those are brave teachers.”
On the other hand, surrounding oneself with 12-year-olds keeps one a 12-year-old, even if the driver’s license disagrees.
“I’m 37 but I’m still 12 inside,” he said.
A coach in his spare time, Blake has two jobs that could pull him away from his classroom: Derek Jeter retiring and the Yankees calling the Chief Kanim main office looking for a new shortstop who can teach sixth grade, or Kobe Bryant calling it quits and the Los Angeles Lakers reaching for the phone.
Humor comes easily from Blake, who said he believes one has to be a little crazy to be a sixth-grade teacher.
“All the college classrooms in the world are not going to get you prepared for a real classroom,” he said. “There are real challenges a kid can’t control.”
The biggest lesson Blake learned in the past decade and a half is that not every child has a home life like Blake’s Rockwellian upbringing in Chewelah, north of Spokane.
“I didn’t realize that kids have some strikes against them. I thought every family made their kids do their homework,” he said. “Now I realize, ‘Man, some kids don’t have that situation.’ That was me being naïve.”
Blake tries to be a good role model for those children, providing at least a little stability and support.
“Not every kid is a star in the classroom, but maybe they are just more reserved,” he said. “Sometimes you see kids out in an activity where they shine. It’s important for kids to see that you’re supporting them there, as well.”
Sebastian Moraga: 392-6434, ext. 221 or smoraga@snovalleystar.com.
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