While their methods differ, Betty Parsons and Beverly Hooper get similarly strong results from the students in their social studies classes. The Santa Clara County Office of Education selected Parsons as one of 30 teachers of the year for 2003­04, while the California League of Middle School Teachers lauded Hooper as this year's outstanding teacher in Santa Clara, San Benito and Monterey counties.

Dartmouth Principal Carole Carlson nominated both women for their respective honors. She says the teachers deserve plaudits for keeping their eighth-graders engaged both in and out of the classroom, and for helping them develop as citizens as well as students.

In Hooper's classes, University of Santa Clara law students visit to talk to the eighth-graders about laws affecting youth. Hooper received a Hewlett-Packard grant to start Dartmouth's Law Club, and she escorts seventh- and eighth-graders on field trips to the university, where they participate in mock trials.

In Parsons' classroom, eighth-graders dress in period costumes and act out certain events in American history. Parsons says this role-playing makes the subject more enjoyable not only for her students but also for herself.

"The thing I like most about my subject is that you really get in-depth with eighth-graders about the history of this country," the teacher adds. "I like to bring them in on the idea that history isn't just a bunch of old people. It's made up of different people at different times."

"I try to make it relevant. I have them understand that history is going on all the time," Hooper says. "The best example of that was Sept. 11," when terrorists attacked the World Trade Center.

Both Parsons and Hooper served on a panel that selected history texts for use in California schools. Parsons says it's important that textbooks and other classroom materials reflect the variety of populations that helped build the United States.

"Kids are ready for that kind of diversity," Parsons adds. "I think they're surprised by how diverse we were when [the country] began."

Parsons says the diversity issue is especially important in her classes since her students come from many different cultures. "In California, Mexican and Spanish history is really important to bring in," she adds. "We get our laws from the English, but I like the fact that the Spanish influence is there, too."

The two teachers agree that literacy is as important to their students as legal knowledge. Parsons is past president of the Santa Clara County Reading Council and is still active in the group's literacy workshops and training programs for teachers. Hooper's students are required to write a book report about a work of historical fiction, and they receive extra credit for outside reading.

Hooper takes steps to ensure that new students will feel comfortable at Dartmouth long before they reach her class. Each summer she oversees Dartmouth Academy, a weeklong program that introduces incoming at-risk sixth-graders to their new campus. Through seminars, she helps parents make the adjustment to their children's middle school years, including identifying and avoiding drug and alcohol use.

"I want to give them tools to live by so they never stop trying," Hooper says. "It's hard to get to all of them, but we try really hard to get to most of them."

Parsons says Hooper and other faculty members eased her transition from elementary to middle school instruction when she began teaching at Dartmouth five years ago.

"Dartmouth is made up of a great team of teachers," Parsons adds. "The people I've worked with have helped me so much. When I came here, I didn't know a single thing about teaching adolescents."

Now, Parsons says, she's really enjoying her eighth-graders. "I like that age. They're lively, and they've got opinions. It makes it much nicer when kids are involved in the subject."

Hooper, on the other hand, has been teaching middle school for 21 years, 18 of those in the Union School District. She says Parsons has what it takes to engage eighth-graders in learning.

"We work so well together," Hooper adds. "We both love history, and we both work to try to get students to have that passion, if not about history then about something in life."