CF- classroom

Classroom

The 7^th grade Science classroom is a small room that has every table filled when all students are present. There is a storage room off to the back corner of the classroom. The storage room contains supplies for varies Science experiments. It also has a sink, microwave, refrigerator, ad a table. It has countertop space on 2 ½ sides of the room. It has cupboards and or drawers above and below the countertops. There are several sinks in the classroom. There are several things for the students to look at. There is a cupboard that has skulls, one that has formaldehyde animals in jars, and one that has sells and rocks. In several of the cupboards there are text books. One the countertops have a microscope that is set up for the students to look through. My cooperating teacher has set up a piece of bark for a couple of weeks and then changed it to a dead dragon fly. Most of the countertops are filled with other things that students can use or look at. My cooperating teacher has a section of countertop space set up with scrap paper student can use. On another section of counter space is return baskets. These baskets, students can find their work that is getting returned to them. One the walls there are posters and leaves. At the front of the room is a large island that has a sink. The teacher’s desk is right next to the island. This island will make it easier to model experiments show examples, but it also limits my movement in the classroom. The only computer and document camera is located on the teacher’s desk. This limits me to teaching from the front of the classroom if I have slides for the class or if I have to model note taking. This also doesn’t allow me to walk around the class while I teach to keep students on task.

For this class, classroom set up makes a difference. When I first started working with these students, the tables were in rows. Each table has a box of art supplies. Each box contains highlights, colored pencils, scissors, erasers, and ruler. It was hard to move around the room with the tables set up this way. Their behavior was normal for 7^th graders. They pretty much stayed on task and there were a few disruptions. When my cooperating teacher moved the tables into groups of 4-6 it was easier to move around the room but, there was an increase in behavioral issues. Students have been complaining about each other. Instead of working in groups, I have had more students ask to work individually. The desks are going back into rows next week. Hopefully this will solve some of the discipline issues in the class. By seeing the change in attitude, I now know that the desks are going to have to remain in rows while I teach this class to cut back on how much discipline I will have to do in the class. I prefer having the tables in groups versus rows normally; it makes it easier for group work.

 In the classroom I have access to a smart board, document camera, and clickers. The clickers will make it easy to give quick quizzes to find out where the students are at in their learning. These quizzes could be pre-tests or formative tests. The smart boards could allow me to make learning interactive with the students. The document camera will allow me to model note taking to the students.

For classroom discipline most of the time my cooperating teacher verbally tells the class to be quiet or holds up 2 fingers. The class usually responds to the fingers being held up. Once in a while a couple of students may not respond and she asks those students by name if we can continue. When those students are quiet, she continues teaching. My cooperating teacher has a rewards system in place. The class starts out with 3 points. Depending on how they behave they can earn more points of points get taken away. At the end of the class period she looks to see how many points the students have earned. She then randomly draws students’ names and if the students’ names were called and they can answer the question pertaining to the topic they are covering in class, then they earn a prize.

The class has participated in group work and class discussions. This class is also use to a variety of tests. When the students are part of a discussion they are required to stand up when they talk. Any time a student has a question they must raise their hand. When they are called on to ask their question they must stand up to ask the question. For all of their tests that they take, they may use their notebooks. 

I may have several challenges with this classroom set up. The first challenge is going to be having 32 students in my class. With such a large class, it increases the possibility for higher discipline issues. With the art boxes on the table during the whole period, students have the opportunity to draw instead of taking notes. I have witnessed on girl use the scissors to cut all of the loose strings on her sweatshirt. Other art supplies can also be used as a distraction. With such a small classroom, it will be hard to move around. This will make it difficult to get to every student and keep them on task. As a mentioned earlier, the set up in the front of the room limits were I can stand and move while teaching. Another challenge that I will have is making room for stations when it is time for students to do group work.

On the positive side, I have a storage room. I have a place to organize my materials before I put them out. Every student has a seat. I don’t have to worry about having students sit at the counter. I have technology to use. Using the technology that I have can make my life easier. For example, the clicker quizzes grade themselves. I do like the stand up to talk policy that the teacher has set in place. It makes the students speak up and hopefully I will be able to hear them better. They are not able to hide behind a book or their hands when they talk.