Golden Apple Award - Andrew Jones, East Side Elementary

Andrew Jones wins this week's Golden Apple Award for his work with special needs kids at East Side Elementary.

Exceptional education students.

He just started at east side elementary last august, but kids in his class are already making great strides toward independent learning.

Mr. jones remarkable impact earned him tonight's... golden apple award.

Natural sound: i'll be here for food city and news channel 12, i would like to present to you this week's golden apple teacher award.

Thank you jasmine: mr. jones is fantastic.

He joined our faculty this august.

And he has revamped our special education, our multi handicapped classroom.

He has just brought a positive and open spirit.

And his students are doing amazing things and we cannot brag about him enough.

Natural sound: yeah money is our talker.

He loves to, he loves his music.

Andrew: i got into the special world when i met my step brother who has down syndrome.

Growing up i had really no idea about special education.

And so on that note he inspired me to get into this field and to care for these kids.

Natural sound: good job angel... hey that's working.

Andrew: they just need a little extra push, support.

Every student that i have has made some sort of progress in some capacity this year.

We have kids who were never able to communicate on their own that are now communicating.

Small things from finishing a task on their own when in the past they needed full support.

Natural sound: awesome job my friend!

Greg: he is absolutely dedicated to the children and his multihandicapped class.

He is determined to get them out in the regular classroom settings so that the entire school knows them.

Natural sound: i'm going to scoot past y'all.

Rachel: mr. jones is changing lives every day.

With the kids he works with his shows them complete an unconditional love every day.

He teaches them how to grow in every single way that they can.

He finds their strengths and pulls them out.

Andrew: i want them to be as independent as they possibly can; to be able to communicate to the best they are able to.

And it all starts here at elementary... even younger.

At this age we start as early as we can.

They learn all of these skills so that they can generalize later on down the road.

If you'd like to nominate a special teacher for the golden apple award, go to our web site, wdef dot com, look for the golden apple section, and fill out the form.

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