Preschool Teacher Honored For Going Above And Beyond

ARLINGTON, VA — Kim Sikora, a special education teacher from Shirlington, was recently honored by Federal Realty for her acts of kindness toward the community.

As part of Federal Realty's Small Things, Big Thanks initiative, the company solicited nominations from the public of people who have gone above and beyond during these uncertain times.

In recognition for Sikora's work as a preschool special education teacher at Glen Forest Elementary in the Baily Crossroads area of Fairfax County, she received a $250 gift certificate to be spent at any of Federal Realty's commercial properties around the D.C. metro area, including Pentagon Row and the Village at Shirlington.

"We can get students that start as early as 2-years-old," Sikora said, describing her students. "They might've been identified really young, and then we get them when they're eligible of age and they can come into the school system."

Part of Sikora's job is to shepherd those students through the eligibility process and help determine the best placement for them, whether it's a pre-school autism classroom, a preschool class-based classroom, or a resource level program. Sikora is a class-based teacher and her students attend school in the mornings.

"With our jobs, we do have home visits that we do, but during COVID it's been a little bit more challenging to do home visits," Sikora said. "We had to switch everything and we do everything virtually now."

One of the things the pandemic revealed was that some of the families in Sikora's class were facing technological barriers that have made it difficult for their children to attend class virtually.

"Whether it was getting them the laptops or helping them sign-on, it was always easier for me to come and meet a parent outside my school building," she said. "Meet with them personally one-on-one, rather than them having to go through the process of requesting an IT ticket and then meeting with someone who might not be familiar with what links the parents would need."

Sikora took every opportunity to make it easier for parents to access online learning. To assist students with virtual classes, Sikora also prepared special materials that parents could pick up at school.

"Especially for kids that are so young, the kids aren't going to know how to log into the computer, so it's a lot of coaching the parents and teaching the parents what to do," she said.

Prior to the pandemic, Sikora made it a point to seek out opportunities to get the parents more involved in what was going on in the classroom.

"Every month, we would have a different type of celebration," she said. "We would call it a Fall Celebration or a Winter Celebration, and we would invite parents to come into the classroom to see the students and what they were doing."

The celebrations would include activities that focused on the different seasons, such as building gingerbread houses for the Winter Celebration. Sikora would be sure to provide alternatives for students who had food allergies or weren't able to eat a particular food. Rather than building a gingerbread house, they would make a house out of paper, so that they could still participate in the group activity.

"We tried to really keep the parents involved," Sikora said. "We're sad that this year is a little bit different because we're not going to be able to do those celebrations until everything gets cleared with COVID for having visitors back in the building."

A parent raising a child with special needs has to deal with many unfamiliar challenges as they try to get their child placed in school, from scheduling medical evaluations to dealing with complicated legal documents.

"It can be very overwhelming for parents, so if we can build that trust from the very beginning, that's something we really try to do in the preschool program," Sikora said. "It's so important to have parents on board with a child's learning because it's going to set them up for success throughout the rest of their schooling. If you can create a strong foundation with the parent from the beginning, then that will help them when they do transition to kindergarten."