How I would facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity in the classroom.

The Perfect Classroom

There are many things I would like to change about my classroom to help facilitate learning and creativity.  However, the pitfalls of time and resources continue to make that a challenge.  I have created a video with my students to represent what I hope to achieve over the years.

At the beginning of my video, you will see  a "bored" class barely staying awake.  I would like to believe my teaching does not put these kiddos to sleep, however, there are days that I feel like I am doing just that.  In order to help them become lifelong learners, I would like to "wake them up", allow them to learn in a format best suited for their needs, and choose a way to represent what they have learned.

The next part of the video represents my understanding that students come to me differently.  They have different needs, different home environments, different learning abilities, and different interests.  I want to design a classroom that is welcoming to all types of students, no matter whether they are the cheerleader, the valedictorian, the class clown, the bank geek (which he selected as his title), or the artist.  I hope to do this by tailoring my learning activities to allow for differentitation and self discovery.

The next part of the video discusses my students' learning styles.  I would like to design a number of activities that would allow me to teach or facilitate learning in the way that each student needs.  First, we would need to explore the students' learning styles.  Do they work best working with a teacher?  Would they benefit from learning in a group?  Do they prefer to learn on their own, by watching videos and performing on-line tasks? Maybe they need to use manipulatives to understand each skill.  If I had my wish, I would develop learning activities for EACH academic standard, for EACH of these teaching methods, and allow students to work at their own pace.

The final part of this video reflects my hope to allow students to be creative with their new found knowledge by selecting their own way to present it to me.  I will always need a skill assessment, but I could develop projects, or project rubrics, that allow the students to draw on their talents and interests.  They could apply what they have learned and "show what they know" in a format of their choice, like a poster, a drawing a song,  a video, or a class lesson.

I would also like to provide my students with an opportunity to move beyond the classroom and use their skills globally.  The biggest obstacle I face are time and resources.  I know the activities are out there somewhere, I just need to find them, create them, and organize them.