OBSERVATION
The physical layout of the classroom is very well thought out by my CT. The students’ desks are placed in groups of four: two facing the front of the room while the other two are placed facing each other. Each student is able to easily see the board and overhead projector screen, but they are also able to easily work together in partners or as groups of four. Along with the main whiteboard and projector screen are faced on the opposite corner as the door to the classroom, which cuts down on distractions from people walking in or out, or by the classroom. The groups of students’ desks are placed in such a way that there is an “inner loop” so that the teacher can easily get from one group to the next.
The teacher desk is put at the back of the classroom. This is mainly because our CT is rarely if ever seated at her desk when students are in the room. It is more of something in the way since she is usually walking around checking students’ work, grabbing new markers or handing back homework/worksheets. There is barely anything on our CT’s desk ever since she likes to keep the room and environment clean and ready for the students to learn.
The walls of the classroom have posters, whiteboards, windows and shelves/cupboards. The posters are motivational in nature or deal with classroom management and rules. Also, there are posters showing and explaining the main cooperative learning activities we repeated do (Rally Coach; Quiz, Quiz, Trade; Round table, etc.). There is also a bulletin board that has a pocket holder pinned to the board to hold the calculators which the students are allowed to use. One of the main thing which is used almost every class is our Ct’s grading rubric. This rubric is posted near the front of the room and contains what level of understanding the students are at and the appropriate grade that goes along with that. It is quite good and our CT designed it herself.
The main technology that is used in the classroom are the calculators that the students use, but also the document camera which is used every day to take notes, go over homework, explain activities and do in class activities. One other piece of technology that we used at the beginning of this week were motion detectors to try to introduce the concept of distance and graphing.
INTERVIEW
Since our CT does cooperative learning this is the reasoning for the groups of four desks. She ideally has four people per a group, but sometimes it turns into five or three. There is an inner loop so that she can sweep around the classroom and get to every group without crawling over kids or running into them. She tucks her desk in the corner because it is not part of her philosophy of teaching. She does this because she is constantly up and moving around with the students. She has her classroom at an angle since she wanted to use both the whiteboard and the document camera at the same time. This also provides more space for student work spaces as well. The safe seat is intentionally at the back of the classroom, same with the “Buddy Room” seat so that they do not cause more of a distraction for the kids trying to learn in the class.
She hangs the NeSA conversation sheet on the walls, not because she is required to, but so the kids have a good understanding of what they are working toward. Also, she has her classroom expectations on her wall so that the kids always know what is expected of them. This is also the behavior plan that is in place for LPS. She decided to put things on her wall that kids constantly have questions about. Class schedule. Grading Rubric. Perseverance posters. Also posters that follow her own personal philosophy on learning and on practicing the work that is done in class.
She has the hand-in boxes where the kids know to turn in work and to pick up work. This is to cause less confusion and congestion when the kids come in and they know exactly where to put their work and to pick up their graded work.
Our CT loves her document camera. She says that if she were given the option to have a smart board she said that she probably wouldn’t use it very much. She uses her document camera for almost everything. She started with an overhead projector, but she loves the document camera since you can put students work up and show them what’s going on, rather than trying to explain it to everyone.
REFLECTION
Based on my own observation of the classroom that our CT setup and uses, I think that I would set up my personal classroom very similarly with little variation. Her classroom is well thought out and uses the topics or things that are important to her to determine how things are set up. It is not just the fact that she likes how it looks. There is a reason for everything in her classroom. The only thing I would change is the choice in posters that she has up. While they all have a great reason to be up, some are difficult to read and some aren’t very clear on what they are referring to, so I would pick some very pointed and direct posters that encourage, yet make the students think. However, since these aren’t the main focus of my classroom, I would still stick to the groups of four students and availability to the whiteboard and the document camera.
It seems like your CT has thought a lot about the classroom management and how the seating and overall arrangement of her room would benefit her class. I really like the idea of the inner loop, so she has a quick way to get to each group without having to squeeze past some students or having some students feel left out. When I taught my lesson, I had my students rearrange their desks into groups and I about tripped over everyone's bags on the floor and the crazy configuration of the desks. It would have been so nice to have this organized desk arrangement before doing any group work.
ReplyDeleteThese motion detectors sound really cool, I wonder how you would incorporate them, or how you did incorporate them in class. I think the students would be really excited to try something out like that, heck I'd be excited to try it out!
I often think that some students don't take advantage of the classroom that they have. It seems like your CT has created a very organized room with the best opportunity for the students to learn. I understand what you mean that some of the posters aren't very clear on what they are referring to. There is one poster in Mrs. KW's room that has a bunch of dots on it, and it says, "One Million?" I think this is a pretty cool poster because it's extremely clear and in one glance it has students thinking about really how big that number is.
I'm beginning to realize how much I need to think about my classroom. It's intimidating to think we'll start with a room with some chairs and desks and we have to turn it into a classroom for our students. Reading everyone's observation about their classroom is really eye-opening.
Thanks for sharing Tyler!