Michele as a teacher

One thing everybody will agree about Michele is that she was the most devoted, dedicated, passionate primary school teacher you could find. She was the sort of teacher I wish my kids always had at school, as she was always so caring & focused on "her kids" (that's how she saw them). She was so willing to go the extra mile, and would even sacrifice her own personal time to tutor children she saw needed the extra help which their parents couldn't afford to provide.

I was privileged to visit Michele & one of her classrooms at every primary school she taught at as a registered teacher. However, I will never forget the first classroom I ever saw of hers - it was at Thabeban State School in Bundaberg.

Michele would usually have a theme for each school term, and that term's theme was "Under the Sea". I remember walking into the classroom & being amazed. Every part of the room - the walls, ceiling, desks, even parts of the floor - was covered with every imaginable creature found within the confines of the ocean, from ships on the top to octopii on the floor, from beautiful seahorses to magical mermaids ... in fact, I reckon if you could find it mentioned anywhere in the annals of human history, whether fact or fiction, you could find it in that classroom!

And I'll never forget the excitement in Michele's voice as she told me of what they had been doing (including being so very proud of her students' work), as well as what she was planning over the rest of the term. It so made me want to go back to school! And THAT was the teacher Michele was - she got you excited about her passion & belief in her kids, and you felt like you were so missing out because you couldn't be there. Yet, as she described it, you felt you were, so vivid & exciting was her description of what had happened. You felt like you knew these children whom she claimed as her own for the time she was privileged to be their teacher. And that was just so Michele, the best teacher I think you would ever meet, the teacher you always wished for yourself at school & the teacher you'd only ever want for your own children.