One Class at a Time: Early Childhood Excellence

PEORIA (25 News Now) - You may not know where Wilder-Waite Grade School is located but these kids in Mrs. Klein’s class are sure glad they found her.

This is her first year teaching early childhood in the program’s second year of existence.

“I have a great group of kids, I have two groups there’s a morning and an afternoon group. They come for about two and a half hours a day. We do running, jumping, bikes, recess, stuff like that.”

Although she’s been teaching for about fourteen years now, her path to the classroom involved a couple of twists and turns.

“I went to college as a musical theatre major, I was at U of I on a farm and I thought, what am I doing acting on a farm in Champaign-Urbana, I think I can still do theatre and can still do something else.”

Realizing eventually she was destined for a career in education.

“I come from a family of teachers, lots of teachers, my mom was a teacher at the Montessori School here in town for years and years, so fell into education.”

Presented with a grant for $1,000 courtesy of 25News and CEFCU, she already has some ideas on what she plans to spend the money on.

“Well you know, we were actually doing some catalog shopping the other day, so we got some ideas of some really bigger toys that you normally wouldn’t get.”

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