Christine Wood is a fifth-grade master teacher at Franklin Elementary School in Bakersfield. Formerly a first-grade teacher at Franklin, Wood helped students make significant reading gains, not only demonstrating standards-based instruction in her classroom, but also extending learning into the home with Reading To Go books, which students could take home and read. Each year, Wood organizes the Jump For Heart Jump-A-Thon to raise donations for the American Heart Association; the Book-It reading program; and Young Author's Fair writing activities. After noticing an increase in the number of students attending school from a local homeless shelter, she initiated a program called "Curl Up with a Good Book," in which students made quilts for homeless kids and presented them to each child along with a book. In 2005, the mayor of Bakersfield proclaimed March 30 "Christine Wood Day" recognizing her as a "positive role model and inspiration to her first grade students." That same year, she was selected to serve on the American Institute for Research's Professional Judgment Panel, "Efficiency and Adequacy in California School Finance," and entered into a two-year contract with Workman Publishing to write and promote educational resources. Wood was named Franklin Elementary's 2006 Teacher of the Year.
