Resilience in the Classroom
We love highlighting the work of our school partners, giving readers an inside look at the ways schools across the state combine science and data with understanding and heart to help their students learn, grow, and thrive, no matter their circumstances. This month, we have the honor of sharing the story of one teacher at one of our partner schools. By sharing her story, we highlight how North Carolina educators bring resilience and inspiration into their work of helping students discover their own.
Mrs.Tamika Farmer, a fourth-grade teacher at G.W. Carver Elementary in Edgecombe County, was named North Central Regional Teacher of the Year in December 2024! She is a finalist in this year’s North Carolina Teacher of the Year selection. North Carolina has recognized its teachers through the Teacher of the Year Program since 1970 and with the help of the Burroughs Wellcome Fund since 2013. The recognition is awarded to teachers in each district for outstanding leadership and excellence in teaching. From these candidates, nine Regional Teachers of the Year are selected. Ultimately, one teacher is honored as the state’s Teacher of the Year in the spring.
While this year’s Teacher of the Year won’t be announced until April, we want to take this opportunity to highlight Mrs. Farmer’s work and approach to teaching, as well as the school community of which she is a valued part. As the Resilience & Learning coach at G.W. Carver, I have had the privilege of observing Mrs. Farmer’s work in her classroom. In November, Mrs. Farmer sat down for an informal interview to discuss her views on trauma-informed practices and her role on the school’s Resilience Team. She believes these aspects are key reasons for her consideration as Teacher of the Year and hopes to highlight their importance while in the spotlight.
In 2023, Carver Elementary partnered with the Center for Resilience and Learning to assess and further develop their trauma-informed practices. The goal of this collaboration is to foster academic achievement by building resilience within the school community. Mrs. Farmer joined as a member of the school’s Resilience Team, a steering committee of staff across multiple roles informing and leading the partnership’s work. In this second year of the school’s partnership, Mrs. Farmer has brought a trauma-informed lens to her co-leadership of the school’s PBIS Committee (Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports). She says she was initially drawn to join the Resilience Team because she thought,
“Oh, trauma – I can definitely relate to trauma.”
Mrs. Farmer is intentionally open about having faced numerous Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) as a child, with both of her parents struggling with chronic substance abuse and mental health problems throughout her life. Growing up, she and her two younger brothers frequently witnessed police at their home, and often had to stay with other family members while their mother was in the hospital receiving mental health treatment. Mrs. Farmer was in JROTC (US Military Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps) during all four high school years. When she was 18, she joined the military and married her husband. She credits a supportive husband who shares her attitudes and goals, as well as her service in the US Army, with helping her continue to build resilience. She also credits her Christian faith. She and her husband both became pastors and are transparent with their church members about their childhood hurts and struggles, as well as their faith practices for growth and healing. Mrs. Farmer has discovered healing by sharing her story and helping church members who want to heal through the sharing of theirs.
Her personal experiences of childhood trauma were partially what drew Mrs. Farmer to become part of the school’s Resilience Team, and also help her to better understand and relate to children in her class facing their own ACEs. She remembers coping as a child by being “quiet” and “sneaky” and becoming a “people-pleaser,” longing to prevent and resolve the anger and arguments she saw between the adults in her life.
Mrs. Farmer knows that children cope with trauma and chronic stress in many different ways, and when her students act out, shut down, or try to be perfect, she has a lens through which she can better understand their reasons and support their needs.
Mrs. Farmer credits the Resilience Team and her school’s partnership with the Center for Resilience and Learning, in part, for helping her add a scientific understanding of trauma and resilience to her personal understanding, and hone practical strategies for helping all of her students strive. Her school and district invited training from Peaceful Schools last year to help staff learn how to facilitate “circles,” a useful teaching tool that can help students feel more at ease, connected, and confident while developing their skills for reflective thinking, effective communication, and problem-solving. Mrs. Farmer and her colleagues had already been introduced to circles by experiencing the process and benefit themselves at Resilience Team or whole staff meetings. Since then, she has used circles to help her students build a strong sense of community with one another and with her. This creates a social environment where they feel safe and understood, allowing them to be honest, reflective, and open to learning new things.
The trust her students have in Mrs. Farmer, and the ways that trust helps them advance academically, is evident from their interactions in the classroom. “Don’t take this from her,” she says to classmates, jumping in to help a student with the answer to a problem. She prompts the student with step-by-step questions, guiding her in the process of solving the problem herself, reminding the whole class of the value of “productive struggle” as a normal and crucial part of learning. “But we’ve all got her back, don’t we?” she says, to clarify that the student braving the struggle is celebrated, supported, and capable.
“I love you, but I don’t love what you’re doing right now,” she says to an off-task student distracting his classmate—a simple way of supporting connection and accountability for her students. Mrs. Farmer has seen how kids like her or families like hers growing up are often labeled as not caring. But she knows that such labels are inaccurate and that people are complex. She remembers the love and positive encouragement she received from her parents, which she carries with her to this day, alongside the examples of what she did not want to emulate as she got older. Her personal experiences with mental health problems and intergenerational trauma, combined with her journey of learning and thriving, have supported a belief that with a growth mindset, all of her students can build on the love and resources in their lives to grow beyond current struggles.
Mrs. Farmer is intentional with her language and attitude toward her students, modeling and encouraging a growth mindset. Moments of playful silliness, brief cultural exchanges with her students around favorite foods or family traditions, acknowledging her own feelings and how she’s managing them, and acknowledging her mistakes and her learning, are all ways that she helps her students feel capable of continual learning and growth. These moments of selective vulnerability help build trust and become part of the foundation upon which students develop their confidence in going through the productive struggle that learning requires. These moments also model a skill set necessary for engaging in and leading effective teamwork, which will serve students’ success throughout their education and careers.
Selective vulnerability is a helpful part of her class circles, too. One of the ways Mrs. Farmer helps her students reflect on their emotions and how to manage them in the classroom is by inviting them to acknowledge their emotions in some of their class circles. She begins a circle by holding a “talking piece” and giving students a prompt. Students then take turns around the circle with the talking piece, sharing what they want to in response to the prompt. Students have permission not to respond at all if they don’t want to. During one class circle, Mrs. Farmer invited students to share about something that made them sad. Using selective vulnerability, she shared in a genuine but calm way that she was sad that her mother had died over the summer. She saw that this allowed some children in her class to acknowledge some significant sources of sadness in their own lives. This modeling and sharing allows students to feel belonging and trust as a class, and at the same time, it helps them learn how to cope with big feelings in intentional, healthy, and productive ways – both keys to future success.
Mrs. Farmer also practices a growth mindset in how she continues to evolve in her work. She notes that she has “changed a lot” in her understanding and approach over her 8 years of teaching, continually gaining and applying new knowledge and practicing new skills. In a press release from NCDPI, Mrs. Farmer described her philosophy this way: “to help empower students to actively explore, create and apply knowledge in authentic and meaningful ways, develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills and prepare them for academic success and future challenges in an ever-changing world…I believe in fostering a supportive and engaging environment where every child feels valued, safe, and motivated to learn.” Her philosophy is evident in her teaching and interactions with students, as well as in the ways she speaks of wanting to use the spotlight as a candidate for Teacher of the Year.
In her classroom and her leadership roles at G.W.Carver Elementary, Mrs. Farmer works with colleagues to help build inclusive and trauma-informed school environments, recognizing firsthand that supporting students’ and teachers’ mental health and wellness is foundational for helping all learn and perform at their best. Now, as Regional Teacher of the Year, she wants to use her platform to share with other educators and to advocate for the trauma-informed practices that can help all NC students thrive.
Highlighting Mrs. Farmer’s story, which she has felt called to share in the hope of helping others, gives us a wonderful opportunity to acknowledge and celebrate the dedication and impact of educators across the state. These dedicated individuals bring their heart, soul, and personal wisdom into their teaching.
Educators in Carver Elementary and in all of our partner schools are quietly applying lessons from their own journeys of struggle, resilience, and learning to improve their teaching and their relationships with students.
In doing so, they help create classrooms and schools where all students can experience the understanding, support, and opportunities they need to discover what they are capable of as they become the leaders of tomorrow. Mrs. Farmer offers us a brave and inspirational example of the difference a teacher makes in the lives of children by showing up authentically and committing to learning in community.