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A Football Coach Who's Changing Education in Lincoln County
•American Book Company•Season 1
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Ben's story resonates with anyone who's found their calling through a powerful classroom experience. "I wanted to do something I love," he explains, describing how his history teacher inspired him to create that same eagerness to learn in future students. After an extensive job search and a year of substitute teaching, Ben finally landed at South Lincoln School where he now teaches 6th and 7th grade social studies while coaching football in a close-knit community of about 300 middle school students.
Welcome to Spotlight for Success by American Book Company. We are here at the Tennessee Council of Social Studies in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. We're here with Ben Fuse, who is with South Lincoln School in Lincoln County, Tennessee. Correct Welcome, Ben. How are you Thank you for having me? Tennessee. Correct Welcome Ben. How are you Thank you for having me? Yes, Great. So tell us a little bit about what brings you to Tennessee Council Social Studies.
Speaker 2:
Just looking to grow and gain some more information you know there's constant change in the world of education and looking to gain some more information and pass that along to my students.
Speaker 1:
Oh, that's wonderful, and can you tell us a little bit about your journey, like why did you choose to become an educator?
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I can remember I'm sitting in my junior US history class and I knew right then and there that that's what I wanted to be. I wanted to be a teacher, playing baseball and football growing up and my mom would come home she was a nurse. She said I had somebody go to the hospital for me, somebody go to work for me tonight, and I knew that I wanted to do something I love and at the time that history class was something that I looked forward to every day. And second block it was like, hey, you get to go to history class and you get to learn something and it's going to be fun. And I said that's, that's what I want to do. I want to be that person that's going to educate those kids and tell that wonderful story that history is.
Speaker 1:
Gosh, that's wonderful. Can you tell us a little bit about your experience getting hired by the middle school and your process of what you were doing in addition to teaching?
Speaker 2:
social studies. Yeah, I had applications from Quikville to the river, it seems like and I subbed for a year and finally got hired and the principal at the time he said can you teach computer? I need a football coach too. And I said, yeah, I'll do anything, I'd like to do that. And the first couple years I taught computer and then they transitioned me and started teaching sixth grade social studies and now I'm teaching sixth and seventh grade social studies and, like I said, it's been a blessing. I've got football along with it and I'm in a small little school. There's about 300 kids in the middle school, 600, 700 kids all together for a K-8, and it's a feeder for Lane County High School. It's a lot of fun. It's a great spot to be.
Speaker 1:
Wow, that's wonderful. Can you tell us a particular experience you had with students where you're like? This is why I got into teaching.
Speaker 3:
At American Book Company in Woodstock, georgia, we are committed to your students' success. As you can see behind me, we have our workbooks and we have online testing and e-books that go on fancy iPads over here, for instance. They're all designed to help your students succeed and have higher test scores on their high-stakes assessments. Give us a call 888-264-5877, or find us on the web, abck12.com, and you can receive a free trial or a free preview book of your choice. Hope to hear from you soon. Bye-bye.
Speaker 2:
Particular students if one of them is different there's hard to say one in particular. They all grow on you, sometimes like penicillin. I can't particularly put one student in instance. Just the way that they change and evolve in your classroom is fun to watch. And on the football field.
Speaker 1:
That is great. That's great. Can you tell us a bit? I understand you used American Book Company books before in your classrooms.
Speaker 2:
Oh, I can't say enough praise about the American Book Companies. You know when they first told me, hey, you're going to be teaching history as a computer. Luckily our county had bought a couple of the books and I sat down that summer and read through the books and would literally take the books and take my slides or go into Google Slides and I would take the books and that would be my slide and from time to time, you know, I'd copy a chart or a graph or a picture that was in there and put that in my slides. And they're extremely beneficial and you can see that in the data from the TCAP results or any other kind of mock test that we've done. The light bulbs that go off in the kids, literally you just take the TCAP or the ABC books and run with them and they're going to lead you to success for the TCAP.
Speaker 2:
I can see it. I've got other colleagues that can see it. I've had other teachers outside of my district say what are y'all doing? And I've walked them through some of that and say, here, and I've slid them a book and their scores have gone up. So the ABC books are something that you really should be interested in. They've got new color copies, minor old black and white copies, so check them out for sure.
Speaker 1:
That's awesome, thank you. Thank you so much, ben. Can you tell us a bit about anything else you'd like to share with the TCSS community?
Speaker 2:
No, just keep up the great work. Reach out to these guys if you're interested and you want your scores to go up. Great people over here. I've had a great conversation thus far this afternoon and therefore, since we're in Tennessee, we've got to say go, Vols.
Speaker 1:
There you go, that's right. Well, thank you very much, ben Puse, south Lincoln.
Speaker 3:
High School Middle Go Eagles.
Speaker 1:
Yeah Sorry. South Lincoln Middle School in Lincoln County, Tennessee.
Speaker 2:
Thank you so much for being part of the program. Thank you, sir. Bye-bye.
