For the last month and a half, I’ve taken a short video every single day. A video, most times, of the most eventful thing I’m doing on that given day. It shows me as a maker as I’m busy producing a variety of work ranging in topic from “remix culture” to “filter bubbles.” At the same time, I’m also a maker when baking cookies from scratch. It shows me innovating as I work with innovative technology to design lessons surrounding it. Also, it shows me innovating when I make countless trips to the library to introduce my students to new characters, new cultures, and new perspectives.
But, most importantly, I think it shows an authentic representation of me. From days in the classroom to visits with my family, this collection shows who I am as a person. It shows what I value, what I find beautiful, what I find comforting. It shows my identity. I think as a teacher I often forget that my students have lives outside of the classroom, just like me. I’ve learned these past few months that being authentic with my students doesn’t lead to informality; it leads to relationship building. It makes us all more human and comfortable in the classroom. As this Master’s class comes to a close, I’ve learned a lot about how students should be collaborating in the classroom and how that collaboration drives students to innovate, learn, understand, and produce content. By understanding my students and their backgrounds, I can better support them through these collaborative opportunities and will continue to do so.
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When thinking of my current classroom, I believe I have made great progress since I first inhabited it (and yes, I say inhabited, as I feel like I live there). When I first started in January 2017 - halfway through the academic year - the teacher prior to me had stripped it to its bones and taken all the books, decorations, materials, and resources with her. Each month, I added more books and more decorations to make it feel more comfortable for my students. I also built an entire curriculum from scratch. However, experiencing each day with middle schoolers, I learned they tend to vocalize their needs, a lot of which I can’t fix. “Ms. Stirling, these desks are so uncomfortable.” My students sit at individual desks, which are the kind where the chair is attached to the desk with a large metal bar. They are old and fall apart constantly, but unfortunately, new seating is not in our district’s budget and flexible seating seems to have somehow earned a negative connotation. The desks also have very little room for students who are large in size, both in weight and height. They are slanted, so when grouped together, they form peaks, not a flat, large surface, which makes collaboration way less valuable. “Ms. Stirling, it’s always so bright in here.” All of my walls are white cinderblock. The one window’s light reflects off the walls. The overhead lights add extra light, making the room even more blinding. Without these lights on, it is too dark to see. I attempted to display my classroom to the best of my ability using Floor Planner: However, for a more accurate depiction, watch this video of my current classroom prepped for this school year: I actually filmed this video to share with my mother, so I was forced to cut the audio from it. I also filmed it before I knew about "Vertical Video Syndrome." I know better now! While I’m happy with it, I would want it to be more collaborative. As it is now, the students, when collaborating or even communicating, have to stand to talk, or move their desks together, which makes the collaboration less meaningful. I would also love to be able to interact more with students, but with so many individual desks, there is very little room for me to even fit down the aisles. So, based on research, I redesigned our learning space. I started by painting a couple of walls to make the room less white. I also added an extra set of windows, so the overhead lights could be less blinding and more natural light would penetrate the room. Next, I removed the individual desks and added collaborative tables of different heights to accommodate students of all shapes and sizes. My ideal dream would be that these tables could be whiteboards. Right now, I use whiteboard markers to spell words for students on their desk surfaces, so I would love if these new tables could be collaborative workstations for my students. According to Howard Gardner in The Third Teacher (2010), “The actual materials, or layout of the spaces, are less important than the provision of ample opportunity to use [musical, spatial, bodily, naturalist, interpersonal, and intrapersonal] intelligences” (Abrams 2010). While I agree that the overall layout may not matter as much to my students or me, I think the new designs help me be able to differentiate and individualize learning in a new way that I hadn’t before. I have many classes with large deviations in student academic ability, so by grouping at tables, I can accommodate and help all students and they can access and reference their many intelligences. My students thrive when doing station-based work, so having the furniture to do that now would only increase engagement, learning, and understanding. Check out my redesign: I think it now is more inviting, more comfortable, and more collaborative. It allows for students to still construct their own knowledge through exploration and communication. This learning space, plus my focus of lesson planning backed by ideas from Universal Design for Learning, makes my class much more engaging and appealing and I hope one day I can make it a reality. ReferencesAbrams. (2010). The third teacher: 79 ways you can use design to transform teaching & learning. New York. Retrieved from https://static1.squarespace.com/static/509c0d15e4b058edb8f35a86/t/50f495b3e4b0c7661ad2ec2e/1358206387728/Ch2+TTT+for+Web.pdf
All screenshots created and taken by author using floorplanner.com. Video created and published by author. *Some materials that appear in video are purchased from Teachers Pay Teachers. |
Jennifer StirlingThis is my #MAET journey! Thanks for reading! Archives
August 2020
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