An Effective Classroom Environment

Environment is everything. Unfortunately, I don't know what kind of a room I will have next year. I also hope I get staff that are skilled and open minded. I want to maintain open lines of communication with my staff. I like to have regular staff meetings as well as a few moments at the end of every day to debrief on the days events. They can provide me with valuable information about how the classroom was setup in the past and help reestablish routines that worked for returning students. I hope that being open to their input will create a safe atmosphere where they feel their talents are being acknowledged and my ideas given a fair chance to succeed as well. It's important that the staff and teachers respect each other and demonstrate that respect by following the same standards for behavior that are set for the students.

I'm also going to pay close attention to routines. A well established routine can eliminate any number of unwanted behaviors. I worked in classrooms on opposite ends of the routine spectrum. The kids in the classroom with planned routines had fewer unwanted behaviors and engaged in meaningful learning more often than those in the classroom without planned routines.

Instructional Strategies

I could do a lot more planning for writing lessons. So much of the writing that we did in my class last year was journal writing. The kids worked independently and wrote the same thing entry after entry. they did improve some, but there is so much more we could have been doing. The most successful writing lessons I did put together was a silly sentence exercise. The kids worked together, had fun and wrote sentences. I have an easier time making math and reading lesson plans. Every time I look at read about lesson planning I know I fell short on my writing lessons.
The writing work i did was with 4th and 5th graders. Their journal entry could be on any topic of their choice. I was looking for spacing and capitalization and punctuation. The lessons were not focused enough and did not require the students to interact with each other at all. Now I'm thinking about central themes and collaborative story telling. I could start with examples and highlight particular skills i want them to work on. Together we can brainstorm writing ideas.
I really want to try writing exercises on a whiteboard as well. The students would have to become physically involved in selecting words and placing them into the sentence. They could be working on group skills, technology, writing conventions, critical thinking and research on a topic relevant to the general education curriculum.

The amount of planning that the Teacher does in the classroom can have a huge affect on the classroom as a whole. Instructional Assistants are often knowledgeable and skilled. However, it is my job as teacher to plan the students instruction. The EA's deliver the instruction I plan. I have worked in a classroom as an assistant where where the Teacher didn't plan anything for the students and the assistants where left on their own to decide how to approach the students IEP goals. Left to their own devices, each assistant worked in their own way with different students. No one had any real idea what techniques the others where using and this led to conflicts, high stress levels and burnout. The lack of planning in that classroom has waisted the talents of the people who work there and is not serving the best interest of the students.

I want to make sure I take the time to plan and to communicate my plans to my staff and include them in the planning process.

Technology

I have wanted an interactive whiteboard for my class ever since I saw a demonstration of one in our technology class. I went so far as to find out how our school could get one at half price. Now i may have found a way to get one for $40.
An interactive white board would grab the attention of most kids, I know it caught my attention. An interactive lesson would make any subject more interesting. matching and sequencing exercises could be made into PowerPoint games. Words could be chosen from a word bank and dragged into position to make sentences. The physical interaction with the information would create even more interest in already popular websites like Starfall.com.
My original idea for this blog was to write about the benefits of having a Wii console in my classroom. What I found was the instructions on how to convert a Wiimote and a digital projector into an interactive white board. An individual named Johnny Lee has written software that will connect a Wiimote to a computer via a blue tooth connection. The Wii mote is used as an infrared camera that follows an infrared LED light pen. The pen can be made for very little cost. Using his instructions, any surface can become an interactive surface. His videos and instructions are available on Youtube.com as well as at his official website. http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~johnny/projects/wii/ . All the necessary software is available for download at no cost!
The SmartBoard website has a page of case studies highlighting the effectiveness of interactive whiteboards in the classroom. I selected one that dealt specifically with special education classrooms. the entire case study is available at http://education.smarttech.com/NR/rdonlyres/61891957-3B4C-4A69-AE61-53129B6C2494/0/CustCaseStudyTheBridgeSchool.pdf .

Learning in Context

A positive learning environment is crucial to all students success and does not happen by accident. One classroom in which I worked over the past year was so busy and full of distractions that I chose to teach my 4th grade group in the commons area outside the classroom. I was sharing the classroom with another teacher and a group of assistants and found it easier to remove my group from the classroom and establish a new set of expectations. All seven students in this group responded positively to this change in setting and expectations. The change in the physical location of the class gave me the opportunity to establish new routines and implement new positive behavioral interventions. I also had the help of an assistant who was eager to try an approach that was different than the system that was being used in the rest of the classroom.
Together we implemented and modeled a new set of behavior as well as a behavior management program that motivated the students and tied in to their IEP goals. It took a lot of work to establish a new routine and keep up with the behavior management program, but the results where worth the effort. Unwanted behaviors dropped dramatically and academic successes increased.
For the second half of the year i worked in a classroom that had a clear established routine and set of expectations for every student. Each student knew their role in what can only be described as classroom choreography. The routines had clearly been established from the very beginning of the year and every assistant demonstrated a high degree of buy in to the classroom philosophy and modeled appropriate behavior. A wide variety of learners separated by grade and academic abilities were able to function in this classroom as individuals, small groups and a classroom as a whole.
As I look forward to a new school year and a new classroom with new students and assistants, I hope to be able to establish clear routines and positive behavioral programs that are tailored to fit the needs of the students I will be serving. I understand that creating such an environment in a classroom may require me to sell my philosophy and management style to my classroom assistants, and that their participation in creating and maintaining these systems will be vital to the students' success.