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Alison.Board Building Inclusion, Communication Tools, Communication with Parents and Guardians, Learning About Your Students

Becoming One

 

In just a few weeks, I can see our group of grade one and two students grow as a community. Evidence is in the way they are aware of other’s likes and dislikes, recognize when someone in missing from the group, and readily offer assistance to one other. Like Samantha, I wanted to gather some information about the students to keep on file. In my first newsletter I requested email addresses to set up parents on automatic updates from the class website. I also asked parents the following:

What delights your child?  What makes your child uncomfortable? What goals do you have for your child?

The responses were brief, but insightful. It not only gave me some information about my students, but the priorities and perspectives of the student’s parents/families. In addition to the information requests, I also used Aaron’s suggestion of an All About Me Bag in “The Heart and Art of Teaching and Learning” (p 45). The children were provided with a paper bag. They brought back their bags filled with five items that they felt best represented themselves. The children were thrilled to share their All About Me bags at the community circle and waited with anticipation to learn more about their classmates with each presentation. To the children’s surprise, there were many areas of common interest that were revealed, which resulted in new friendships that extended to recess and the playground.

September was full of new beginnings. At times I questioned whether we were accomplishing enough, such as the curriculum. As Tina discussed in her blog entry, I needed reminders to “go slow.” So as I planned our reading and writing, I tried to incorporate our community-building activities. Two read-alouds that the children adored and were able to easily connect to regarding self-esteem and inclusion, were: One by Kathryn Otoshi and The OK Book by Amy K Rosenthal. These books provided us with rich literature for our reading and writing program, while supporting our  discussions on community.

 

 

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Samantha.Perrin Building Inclusion, Communication with Parents and Guardians, First Week Reflections, Learning About Your Students

Getting to Know My Students

During the first month of school, there is a lot to do.  Finding myself in a new grade and new school every year, I am  seeking out resources, and learning the ropes. One thing that hasn’t changed for me from every differing grade and school, is the need to get to know my students from early on in the first month, so that I am able to best meet their needs in the classroom and transfer the information seamlessly to others. For me, getting to know my students personalities and needs early on, allows me to create a safe learning environment that reflects what the students want to get out of their learning experience and also develop a system that has the information and supports in place for myself, a teacher returning from leave, or a substitute teacher.

This month, I began by learning about my Grade 1 students needs in two ways:  creatively– using ideas from The Heart and Art of Teaching and Learning (ETFO, 2011); working with the students to develop a classroom contract that reflects their wants and needs for their learning environment, and practically – developing my own personal informational database on the needs, routines and information about the unique students that I am teaching.

To develop a classroom community in Grade 1 that reflects my students’ wants, I drew from Leah’s helpful ideas (p.43, The Heart and art of Beginning Teaching and Learning), to generate a list of ‘promises’ from the students to one another.  I’m finding that these ‘Inclusion Activities’ are helping me to  establish the tone of the students’ classroom and decide what they think the classroom should look like, sound like and feel like.  Last week in Grade One, each student shared one promise or wish for the classroom (for example,  not to butt-in in line, or to ask permission before touching each other’s things) and then they illustrated their promise for a class book.  The students are enjoying reading and reminding each other of their ‘Promises’ to one another and learning about the kinds of things that help us  to minimize conflict and increase safety in the classroom.  For me, this activity illustrated that the students want a lot of the same rules and routines that I want in establishing a harmonious classroom environment and we plan on working on dramatizing what these promises actually look like in practice.  It has helped me to establish and reaffirm what is important to my students in creating a safe and inclusive classroom environment and pare down what is really important to my students in their daily school life.

I am also gathering important personal and historical information on my students for their files so that I can have a better understanding of their background and so that I am able to meet their safety and learning needs.  This will serve as an aid for me when communicating with parents and guardians, and also will enable me to communicate important information to substitute teachers and the teacher that will be returning from leave when my LTO is over. I sent home a Student Background form for parents to complete on their child for my files. :

  • child’s name, birthdate
  • siblings, both in the school/out of the school; household members
  • languages spoken at home
  • allergies/dietary restrictions (i.e., religious, health related or otherwise)
  • before school/afterschool care/ who picks up the child (in primary grades)
  • emergency contact numbers, email addresses, best times to call
  • routines (i.e., do they go home for lunch, stay at school etc.)
  • the child’s strengths, areas of need or other important information that the parent wishes to communicate.

By planning creative and inclusive activities I hope to elicit meaningful responses from my students and learn what they really want to get out of their day to day classroom.  Be gathering practical information for my records, I hope to better manage important information on my students, so that I can understand my students’ needs, use the information as an ‘at a glance’ about the child, and so that the knowledge of the individuals who make up the classroom community is followed through with when I am away. Throughout both processes I hope to develop a community of students who are having their safety and social needs met and allow for subsequent teachers to do the same.

Building Inclusion in the classroom is something that doesn’t only happen during the first week of school, it’s something that teachers and students should work on and revisit consistently throughout the year.  So, if you feel that you may have not done ‘Inclusivity’ justice during your first crazy week at school, rest assured that you have the whole month (and the rest of the year) to bring great activities and ideas into the classroom.

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Roz.Geridis Building Inclusion, Classroom Management, First Week Reflections, Learning About Your Students

I feel like a beginning teacher again!

I am new to my school and was out of a classroom for a few years.  Finding resources (which I know are in the building), getting to know staff and the school culture, and starting the school year have been an exciting and great experience. I have an all boys grade 5/6 class. Many colleagues wanted to give me information about the boys but I asked for the information to be about the class as a whole with no names to be shared. I really wanted the boys to have a fresh start to the school year. Since I did know the boys did not feel very good about their learning abilities and have all been together since grade one, the first week was very important to me (and to the students). We did a variety of activities to building inclusion, develop a learning environment for the boys to feel safe enough to learn in the classroom, and setting the classroom management routine.

 

The week before school started, I mailed out a card introducing myself and asking the boys to bring their ideas for our classroom. This is the theme I have used throughout the two weeks, it is not my classroom it is ours. The kids have really taken to that philosophy and enjoy making classroom decisions.  We have a class name “Funky Monkeys”, the boys are researching pets (I gave them a maximum of $100 budget), and we have Ms. G’s bucks where they can purchase new pencils/erasers (to replace lost ones), field trips, fun afternoon off, and I am sure a few more ideas will develop throughout the school year. I have set up the bucks in $3, $4, $6, $7 to help with multiplication for many of the boys. We still have to figure out how much for each of the rewards but the boys have begun to pool their money together for a field trip. It is very interesting to watch a bank concept develop.

An early routine to help with classroom management is classroom rules, which are referred to regularly and utilized. Looking back at my first week reflection, I would like to share a great lesson I completed in relation to classroom rules. I started off the activity by giving the boys post it notes and asking them to write one rule on each post it. The boys were then asked to post the rules on the whiteboard. We then went through each of them (some were really silly, we all just laughed) and grouped the rules in similar piles. Interestingly, the kids had come up with six topics, which will lead us to the six rules. You want to keep the number of rules to five or six. Even less for primary students. We then identified each pile with a title or lead word. I then read a story to them about school rules (a variety of titles are out there and ask your librarian for an age appropriate recommendation) which led us to develop some sample rules. We started with the title or lead word and the boys gave me some sample rules, in positive language. I did have to guide the process of positive language through examples. Once everyone gave their ideas, we looked at all the rules on the board and combined rules where we could. Then we talked about rules being very specific or big enough to include many aspects. For example, respect people when talking, respect other people’s cultures led to respect others. Once we were down to two suggestions, we voted on the rule to keep. This process took three days. It is very important for the students to have ownership of the rules in order to follow them. Once the rules were developed, we started referring to them right away. This week, I overheard students reminding each other of the rules.

 

                  

 


Classroom management is not included in the curriculum but is equally important in teaching. You need the students attention in order to teach. Take the time to invest in building an inclusive environment, involve your students and really enjoy the start of the school year. This is the best time to get to know your students; have fun with it.

 



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Alison.Board Before School Starts, Building Inclusion, Classroom Layouts, First Week Reflections, Learning About Your Students

Starting Anew

Every school year is an opportunity for a new start for all teachers. Whether it is getting to know new students, new staff and teaching partners, or even a new classroom. This September I am experiencing all three, and after the first week of school I am just beginning to reflect on all the change. I am welcoming the renewed energy (after a very relaxing summer) and the challenges that teaching brings.

In the last week of August, I took the time to think about the classroom environment and what changes I could make to create an inviting and inclusive environment for the children and for me. Although it is a Grade one and two class, I want the students to have areas/learning centres that will encourage inquiry and collaboration. So, I started with a new layout that includes a reading corner, an art studio, and a math centre using cozy corners and spaces with shelving along the walls. Then I made two groups of six desks, one group of four desks, and added two round tables (I would have preferred round tables for all the students, but had to improvise with what was available). There is a place for individual book bins and pencil/materials trays for the students to access easily, so they don’t have to keep anything in their desks (allowing for flexible seating throughout the day). On the first day of school, I let the children sit wherever they want and place their “portable” name card at their desired spot. It was interesting to observe that all of the children, except one, kept the same seat all week!

Our first weeks together in Room 3 are important for creating an inclusive space and building our classroom community. We are learning about one another with Tribes activities, such as passing an inflatable globe and sharing “What’s important in my world?” Last week, we read the book One, by Kathryn Otoshi, which recognizes differences and encourages kindness and inclusion (already deemed a favourite by the kids). In their tribes, the children used watercolour paints to demonstrate their own feelings and connections to colour. These paintings are displayed in the classroom to remind us of our own similarities and differences. Otoshi’s book continued to inspire us through the week as we shared personal experiences about feelings at the carpet before writing about them in our Writing Workshop.

Despite a few hiccups for the grade ones learning new routines and adapting to a full day of school (a few tears at lunch time), I think the first week was a good first step for the new school year.