Classroom Culture

My classroom is definitely much different than the ones I grew up with.  Technology plays such a huge part.   We use two different programs for Title 1, one for 4/5 and one for k-3.  Both programs have students work on reading skills until mastery. This is something that was hard to do without technology.  Each person is working on a different skill at different levels. 

It hasn’t changed however, to the extent that Thomas and Brown describe in their book  A New Culture of Learning: Cultivating the Imagination for a World of Constant Change.  This year is a bit different because I am working with small groups of students, but not as different as it should be.  In the past years, though, my classroom was much more of what they call the mechanistic perspective where efficiency is the goal.  “The goal is to learn as much as you can, as fast as you can.  In this teaching-based approach, standardization is a reasonable way to do this, and testing is a reasonable way to measure the result.”  (2011)    I don’t see this changing significantly when state testing is such a big part of education.  I would really like to get to the point where “in the new culture of learning the point is to embrace what we don’t know, come up with better questions about it, and continue asking those questions in order to learn more and more” (Thomas and Brown, 2011) 

One thing I really like about watching the “Why Minecraft Inspires Me” (Drakkart. (2014, February 15) is that the kids were experts.  True experts that had valuable information to share!  Johnny and Newman were great!  This is a true example of learning “within the world” instead of learning about the world as Thomas and Brown put it.  They discussed collaborating within the game with so many different people.  What a great way to learn a social skill that is hard to teach!  I was also impressed when it was mentioned, (I don’t remember by who) that the kids were nice to each other in the game.  With all the talk about cyber-bullying going on, this was a nice surprise.

 

 I am going to have go look into playing Minecraft.   The best place to start would be with my 12 year old daughter who loves the game.  I work with a group of 2^nd graders who do well in math.  This might be a great way to inspire them!

 

In Alansa Brown’s post “Your Classroom’s Culture: Dare to Make a Change” at http://www.chipdizard.com/dare-to-make-a-chang/ she gives a good piece of advice. 

 

  “Our children have become so accustomed to being spoon-fed. Their parents do it, and other teachers do it. Help yourself, and make them accountable for learning.” 

 I see this often with students. Many think that they should just be given the answers to most everything that takes more than the smallest of initiative or energy.  It seems to get worse every year.  Now when they really don’t know how to do something or how to find an answer, of course you are there for them.  When I have a student who seems to be this way, I will often ask them what they think they answer is.  I may even ask them to guess.  “If you had to guess, what would you say?”  This gives them the freedom to answer without fear of being wrong.  Often they know it, but are afraid of being wrong.  In dealing with younger children, some will want everything read to them.  If I know they are capable, I have them read it to me.  This shows them that I am not there to read it for them, but am there when they need help.  If they ask me to read a problem to them, I ask them to tell me which word they are having difficulty with.  Then they usually read it.  Sometimes there is a problem work, sometimes there is not.  Being spoon fed is a hard habit to break.