Overall I believe that the school environment in where I am doing my practicum is very inclusive and welcoming towards students and their families. It is highly important to create an environment in where students feel welcomed, safe, accepted, and taken in mind in order for them to be more successful. In the short time that I have been at this school I have been able to presence various methods used to create an environment in where the students can see themselves reflected. There are many factors that contribute to a schools environment, such as the rules, a schools vision statement, displays hanged around and many other. Yet the two areas that I will be focusing on to convey the school environment will be through the relationships fomented between staff and students, and among students themselves, and through the relevance or the connections the students can make between themselves and their environment at this school.
Relationships play a big role in how a school’s environment can be set up. Part of the school’s vision is to know every student by name and this is something I have been able to presence. Not only do teachers know the names of the students in their classroom but also of other students that don’t belong to their homeroom. I have also noticed how the principal and the staff in the office greet students and even some family members by name. Doing so helps students create relationships with their peers, it makes them feel important, noticed and cared about. Particularly in the classroom I have been working in the teacher does something called “lunch buddies” in where she randomly selects a group of students and asks them if they would like to have lunch with her and they just have lunch in the classroom sitting in the carpet and having a conversation about anything the students bring up. I think having these types of activities help fortify the relationship between teacher and student, because the student gets to see the teacher outside of the instructing time, and gets to see another side of them and where the teacher joins in a common conversation not necessarily about an area of study. In the classroom there has also been an emphasizes in group work, partner work, and they also have teams for a project they were working on in social studies. This gives students the opportunity to work with different people and build those relationships among themselves, by helping each other out when they are stuck or by working together to solve a problem.
When moving towards relevance I believe students can see a connection when first walking into the building because there are many flags of different countries displayed on the walls and being able to see your flag represented can give students a sense of pride. The school’s morning announcements are also done in two languages spanish and english, taking in mind that a great percentage of the student body is Hispanic/Latino being able to hear your home language used everyday in the morning announcements makes students feel welcomed and it also lets the students know that they don’t have to limit themselves to only speaking english, that they are welcomed to speak their home language. In the class that I’m working in I have been able to see how the teacher makes the material relevant to her students by giving her students math problems with their names on them and with scenarios that are applicable to them or to their life. Everyday in the morning students get to share their mood for the day and the reason for being in that mood. That is something that students get to share on a daily basis with the class that is relevant to them and it also helps them to be able to name their emotion and set the mood or the environment for that day in the classroom
Education 240 