Thursday, October 30, 2008
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.
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I, too, believe the writing assignment given in Walking Trees is a good way to create classroom unity. In fact, I wrote about this same concept in my post. Giving students "free writing" opportunities allows the teacher and other students to discover that person’s interests, hobbies, culture and/or family situation or structure. Sharing the "free write" assignment with the class allows for many different classroom conversations.
I feel a way of creating community in the classroom is through writing. There are plenty of writing samples in Walking Trees showing how students express themselves through writing. I liked the Half Autobiography story that was written on page 120 in Walking Trees. When students write autobiographies it can serve many purposes. First, students will get to know themselves better, second, they will have the chance to learn about each other. Writing gives students the opportunity to talk about their families. It will also give them the chance to talk about what is important to them and what they value. This leads to community building, students create a place in the community to which we belong. By sharing autobiographies, it allows others to hear and understand who we are in ways that support the view we have of ourselves. For a teacher, reading students writing can help you learn about students' interests and structure the classroom around them. In parent teacher conferences writing shows parents that you value their child's individual needs.
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