Learning Outcome 5: Manage classroom in a variety of ways to promote a safe learning environment
Coming into a classroom more than half way through the year can be a very daunting task. As a student teacher, you want to make a meaningful connection with your students as fast as possible in the short amount of time you are with them. I found that taking the steps to create that connection helped garner a safe learning environment. The first step that I took in both placements was making seating charts. I engaged each student in a one on one conversation where I introduced myself and asked them how they would like to be addressed. I was showing them that I was interested and invested in their individuality and wanted to get to know them. For the age groups that I interacted with, this step was monumental because often their growing identity is not what is most important when it fact it is. After I made this first step, I reinforced it by greeting them at the door each day before class began. I wanted to engage the students on a personal level before we began whatever work in the classroom.
In doing that ground work I set up a foundation for a safe learning environment. Students were already open to conversations with me, and that made way for class discussions. I also found that it was critical to tell students that it is okay to be wrong, because often times they were on the right train of through. Too often students shut themselves down because of fear of failing and fear of how that can be reflected back at them from their peers. To combat this fear of failure was to ask students to explain their thought process whenever they gave me an answer. By giving a justification to their reasoning, students were more likely to want to give their answers and learned more about themselves and their peers. Even when students would break into pairs or small groups, I found it important to highlight what they found that was positive in their work and the work of their peers. When students at the same level reinforce the positive messages that you have been implementing in your instruction, students gain so much more.
An example of this type of instruction came from lessons on two different days. Both of the lesson plans that I included took place during my second placement in a middle school setting. As students' were entering the final weeks of test preparation before the state ELA test they were asked to reinforce their testing skills through various ways. As a Do Now activity, students were given a short passage that was riddles with 6 blanks. These blanks corresponded to multiple choice answers on the side of the page. As students reported out their answers, they were also asked to note what skills they used to get that answer. Even if they choose the incorrect answer, they were still using the test taking skills correctly. By reinforcing that positive act, students are more likely to continue to share and use that skill. In the lesson plan i included, students were asked to read exemplars of student work, grade it using a rubric they were familiar with and note why it received that grade. This layered process accesses students on various levels of various learning types. They are able to interact with the works with their peers, pooling their understandings and teaching each other new skills in the process. After grading these exemplars, students were then asked to grade their own long response essays that were based on the same prompt. Before they could tear down their own work, they were instructed to look out for something that they really felt proud of and wanted to share. Because they were on the look out for positive aspects of their work, students graded themselves more realistically and they wanted to share their works with their peers.