GRAIN VALLEY, Mo. (AP) – Four more young children have come forward to say a suburban Kansas City second-grade teacher touched them inappropriately in his classroom.

The new charges announced Wednesday against Matthew Nelson raises the number of alleged victims to eight.

Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker announced new charges Wednesday against the 33-year-old Nelson, a teacher at a Grain Valley elementary school and former “Teacher of the Year.”

Nelson now is facing five felony counts of first-degree child molestation and three felony counts of first-degree statutory sodomy.

Prosecutors say all of the charges involve boys. They say the new victims came forward after Nelson was first charged in January with abusing four others.

The children say Nelson usually fondled them in the classroom, often when they went to his desk to seek help with assignments.