A conversation with Berol Dewdney: Tools teacher and Maryland Teacher of the Year

‘Leading with love’

When she was a child, Berol Dewdney’s mother instilled in her the importance of establishing a sense of purpose. “My mom always said life was about leading with love,” says Dewdney. “She said it’s about growing your brain and giving your heart. [Ultimately, it] propelled me to become a teacher, and became my first classroom mantra.” 

Not the teacher she wanted to be

Drawn to their mission of expanding opportunities for all children, Dewdney applied for a teaching position with Teach For America and accepted a placement in Baltimore. There, she taught at a school where preschool student needs were high and resources were scarce. Dewdney recalls the school’s preschool curriculum “wasn’t helping me do right by students, and it wasn't making me the teacher I wanted to be. The worksheets, flashcards, and culture of compliance weren’t driving growth or bringing joy to our classroom,” she says. “My students had particular needs to be ready for kindergarten; but a drill-and-kill approach that made PreK look like first grade was not going to address the word gap they experienced. My own mission became clear: find, learn, and execute the best early childhood curriculum and practice for my students in Baltimore, putting them on a path to college.”

Tools ‘taught me how to teach’

Dewdney discovered Tools of the Mind as an intern with a public charter school in Washington, D.C. “That was the moment my life changed, because everything that I dreamed of, I now saw happening on the ground at a really high level of efficacy,” she says. “Tools taught me how to teach by teaching my how kids learn,” she says. “It was the first experience in which I learned how to be a brain builder.” 

“Tools taught me how to teach by teaching me how kids learn.”
-2023 Maryland Teacher of the Year Berol Dewdney

Dewdney, now a Tools of the Mind-endorsed instructional coach, was drawn to the way Tools melds Vygotskian theory with neuroscience research and strategies to support and amplify children’s growth and development. She credits Tools with equipping her with essential knowledge about student learning. “Tools gives teachers the tools to ensure every child becomes a successful learner,” she says. “It embeds the development of executive functions and leverages make-believe play and a classroom culture of co-regulation and peer scaffolding.” She emphasized that, “There is a difference between playful learning and intentional and rigorous make-believe play: it is powerful and intentional.”

Expanding her reach

“To see Tools in action, to see that it was possible, made me wonder why this wasn’t happening 50 miles north in Baltimore. After that experience, I knew I needed to figure out how [to implement Tools] in Baltimore,” says Dewdney. “I felt like I finally had the tools to do more justice by the people I loved most in the world.”

In 2015, Dewdney spearheaded a successful Tools pilot program that ultimately led to full curriculum implementation. Two years later, she joined Baltimore City Public Schools Commodore John Rodgers School as a PreK department lead teacher. Dewdney also took on a leadership role with the 100% Project, a collaborative partnership formed by Commodore and four partnering Baltimore schools working to turn around inequitable public education. 

“The culture I’ve created in my classroom through play-based learning has been so significant,” explains Dewdney, “that I now support the implementation of the curriculum in 25 classrooms across the district, impacting approximately 500 students, 60 educators, and 15 administrators.” All five schools have seen an increase in kindergarten readiness assessment scores since the program’s inception.

The tools to do more

Dewdney knows students need self-regulation inside and outside of the classroom: “To wait for a turn, to blend sounds into words, to compare text in middle school, and to apply for college and a job. Like a carpenter needs tools to build a house, we need mental tools to build our foundation. Too often,” Dewdney continues, “our students are expected to get to all of that other learning and living without that toolbox and without the safe, loving and connected environment needed. When we make that mistake, we set students on a path in which they still struggle emotionally in third grade and are not reading in sixth.” With Tools, students access “rich centers where shared learning and oral language fuel cognitive, social, and emotional growth. The result is transformational growth and joy.”

She gives an example of a child who entered PreK developmentally behind by several years. “He couldn’t identify any letter sounds and handled his big feelings with physical aggression that was unsafe,” she says. Through Tools, Dewdney supported his learning and self-regulation development. The result? The child left PreK writing full sentences independently. And he even became a peer leader, helping his classmates calm down and solve problems. He had the tools he needed to succeed in kindergarten and beyond. 

“[Tools] develops students' capacities and teacher capabilities and capacities, and that's how the real growth happens. It's not a one-time thing, a one-and-done. It's about continuous development for teachers and for students. With Tools, every teacher and every student is met where they are and enabled to get where they need to go and beyond.”
-2023 Maryland Teacher of the Year Berol Dewdney

Teacher of the Year: A well-deserved honor and achievement 

Dewdney believes that early childhood education is key to achieving educational equity. Her passion for and skill in making meaningful change in her district garnered recognition and admiration from colleagues and administrators alike. In 2022, Baltimore City formally recognized Dewdney as the district’s Teacher of the Year. That award put her in contention for the state’s Teacher of the Year award and, in 2023, Dewdney was named Maryland’s Teacher of the Year by the Maryland State Department of Education, bringing national attention to the important work she has been doing to bring high-quality, equitable, early learning to Baltimore children.

We are inspired by Dewdney and her impact on preschool children and their families. We are proud to look to her as a leader in our Tools community!