WTOC Top Teacher: Kara Martin

SAVANNAH, Ga. (WTOC) - This week’s WTOC Top Teacher says she hopes her first grade students love school and love to learn.

Kara Martin is an elementary school teacher at J.D. Dickerson Primary School in Vidalia. She says the students in her classroom are like her children, and she’s their biggest cheerleader.

“I like teaching the little ones because they have so much energy and they are so excited and they love their teachers and they love to be at school. They love to learn and the little ones they have the light bulb moment they get excited and they want to be here,” Martin said.

The school is a place Martin knows well.

“I grew up right here in Vidalia, Georgia. I walked the halls of J.D. Dickerson when I was in first grade,” she said.

Martin has been teaching first grade for 14 years. She said teaching is something she has always wanted to do.

“I did always want to be a teacher, my dad had tried to convince me to be a pharmacist. He’ll think that’s funny. So I went to school to be a pharmacist, but changed within a month because I always knew I wanted to be a teacher in the classroom with kids,” Martin said.

Martin said she tries to make a fun, loving space for her students to learn.

“My goal for my students is to grow throughout the year, to feel safe and feel loved and to improve during the school year. When they leave me, I want them to be able to read, and to love to learn,” she said.

“I want them to succeed. I want them to do whatever they want to do in life, to grow up and be whatever they want to be in life, and that school is so important, and that I am always cheering for them,” she said.