classroom community

I feel that the way of creating a community in the classroom is through expression. It is important for teachers and students to get to know one another. You need to be able to share with your students who you are that way they feel comfortable with you. Your students are in the classroom for a long time and it is important that this feels almost like a home away from home for them. A great way for students to express themselves is through writing, or even when they are in centers. You can watch the children and get an idea of who they are. The classroom becomes a second home for some of thesse children and you need to make them comfortable in it. All students in your classroom need to work together at some point so they get to know everyone. Working with people who are not just your friends helps the students get to know everyone. In walking trees the students are able to express who they are through writing stories. In one of the schools an idea was given to let the students write about basicly whatever they want, do not assign them a topic. Some teachers protested and said that they like to assign topics and it has always worked for them. I feel that these teachers need to be more open when it comes to letting children express themselves.

lessons learned from children

I feel that children can teach us a lot. It is important to pay attention to children all of the time. Children like to have fun and be care free. I think that adults can learn from this. Adults sometimes need to relax kick back and have fun. Children teach me that it is ok to have fun. As a teacher it is important to watch and learn from children. Children also teach us that it is ok to make mistakes because all children make mistakes as well as adults. When a child makes a mistake they just try and try again. It is important for adults to relize that if they make mistales it is ok to try and try again. In the Walking Trees children have to right stories about something that is important to them. When I was reading what the children were writing about it showed me that everything is important to children. This taught me not to judge people. It might sound weird that I learned that from this, but I did . Children write about whatever they want and do not worry about what anyone else is going to think. This is important. i learned to to worry about what people think and not to judge what people do.

expand knowledge base

I feel that in a classroom there are different ways that you can expand your knowledge base about other racial/ethnic groups. I think that the best way is through your class library. If you keep books about all different etnic groups children in your class will learn about different racial/ethnic groups. I also feel that as a teacher you should read these books that was you also learn about these etnic and racial groups. One experience that I had that taught me about my own biases was when I first went away to college. I had to now take classes that were about othere cultures and ethnicities. This was something that I never had to learn about when I was younger. I wish that I read books when I was younger or someone taught me about different racial/ethnic groups. This would have helped me be more openminded when I went away to school.