Future Classroom

     In a way, all my images and answers are connected to each other, so finding a place to begin is difficult. I will start with an explanation: I grew up in a military family. I never stayed in one town for more than 3 years, in one house for more than 2. Because of this, I'm really adaptable (probably to a fault), and I'm drawn to teaching in Department of Defense schools, where I can relate to the experiences of the students I'd be teaching, and where my desire to travel while still contributing to communities I take part in can be met.
     I know that I would have little control over the physical structure of my classroom (though my idealized classroom still has a wall of windows, space for a couch in the corner, a large projector and whiteboard) but two things that are absolutely necessary: 1) Lots and lots of books. I want to have books in many different subjects and genres and lengths and reading levels. As an English teaching major, encouraging reading is really important to me, and depending on the grades I teach, I'd like to have weekly free reading assignments, so I'd need the kind of collection capable of appealing to many different students. I'd like to have a place where I can spotlight a different book each week. 2) A community involvement bulletin board. I strongly believe that the success of a student relies in part on the kind of adult mentors they have growing up. I also believe students are capable of a lot more than they believe, and when given the resources, can positively change their communities. Combined with my hope to teach military brats, who are often unfamiliar with the community they live in, I've always wanted to have a bulletin board featuring as many community events, clubs, scholarships, programs, and service opportunities applicable to my students as I can find. I want to encourage community activism and the independent pursuit of extracurricular interests.

So many books!

Community Involvement Board

     The students themselves will like be a slightly more diverse group of kids than those of typical American classroom if I'm able to teach DOD, since the US military has more employees of color than is represented in the total US population, and since segregation via zoning laws will be virtually nonexistent in overseas bases. I haven't thought much of cultural background of students I'd like to teach outside DOD. Whatever the case, I imagine the students I'd be working with will have grown up with a lot of the technology I'm only getting used to now, and this would also affect what they're doing during the class, how many outlets I'll be competing for attention with, the differents skills and literacies they'll bring into the classroom, and how they're most used to communicating. If they're anything like the students I went to school with though, kids will likely be socializing, doing other homework, maybe making paper airplanes, maybe throwing paper airplanes, and hopefully listening and engaging in class discussion. Depending on the school (Alconbury RAF vs. Ramstein AFB for example) the class sizes could be anywhere from 7 to 25 students, and the teaching style would likely reflect that.

DOD school student and faculty

     Classroom policies are one thing I have thought about the least, which will most likely come back to bite me. Since I'd like to have a discussion based class, the first few days of class would be spent on how to discuss ideas respectfully and professionally. Classroom policy would be based on those rules of respecting their peers, their teachers, and the texts we're studying. I've toyed with the idea of having professionalism points. A bit like attendence or effort points without the condescension that points 'for effort' would entail. If a student needs to work longer on an assignment to get it done properly, or to understand a concept before turning it in, I still want to grade their work for its quality and not tardiness, but the circumstances regarding it's late turn in (if they asked for extra time in advance or day of, if they came to me with questions about the assignment beforehand) may affect their professionalism points for that term. Students with perpetually late assignments, with tardies and absences to class, or who are excessively disruptive in class may lose professionalism points. I don't know how effectively this would work in action instead of theory, I haven't thought through all the potential drawbacks, but I like the idea of a students ideas and work being given fair scores despite their behavior otherwise. I think the best classroom management is to make sure the kids don't get bored, them thinking, moving, discussing, writing, actively doing something at all times. I don't know yet how I'll help students who still struggle paying attention in class, but I hope to build the patience to work with them on an individual basis and find what works best.

Discussion Circles

     Like I said, I'd like lessons to be discussion based in my class; I want to show that I value questions and am flexible enough in lessons to follow the interests a specific class might express. At the same time, I know that just because I'm a discussion based learner, doesn't mean all my students will be as well. Giving students time to work independently on projects or in small groups would also be important. I'd be teaching english, so we'd be reading various literary texts, but I also think an english classroom can be a great venue in which to discuss ideas present in most subjects, teach communicative skills, and just get kids excited about learning. When possible, I'd like to have student participation in the deciding where lessons go (when we aren't practicing more concrete writing skills) and being involved in the teaching process. This could mean students are put in groups that help that each teach one writing or analysis skill to the class, but it could also mean (depending on how flexible the school board is, I've heard DOD schools are a lot stricter than many public schools in the states) that students decide what texts we read or what forms of assessment we use. Let's say we're reading a required book and talking about identifying literary devices. We may take a moment to discuss the main ideas in the passage we most recently read, identify some themes as a class, and then split into smaller groups, each assigned a literary device, which would try to find examples of that device in the text that help to create the themes we talked about as a class. Then each group would share their device and examples. If we still have time at the end of class, that time would happily be used to talk about how the ideas/themes we found in the book still apply to our lives today.

Student-led Classroom

     My job as a teacher in these lessons may be to mediate discussions, help groups that are struggling with their specific assignment, answer and ask prompting questions, and if needed bringing students back together to refocus on a topic at hand. My job would also be to teach skills that are new to the students, so short lectures to introduce new concepts at the beginning of classes will also be in my job. During class students will ideally be engaged in the lecture or discussion, in small groups, classmates would (in theory) keep each other on task, especially if they're asked to share a finished product, a poster, a picture, etc. with the class. If we have extra time in class students may also be reading.
     Assessments are really difficult to do fairly, since no one assessment caters to the strengths of each student. This is up there with professionalism points on the 'in theory' scale, but after reading about different forms of assessment, I like the idea of a portfolio. If each term used a different type of assessment (a socratic seminar the first time around, a creative writing project the second, a presentation the third and a culminating essay the last) and all were combined in a portfolio for the end of the year, I could understand their engagement and understanding of ideas in different contexts, placing value on their own ideas, their ability to express and organize them, as well as their ability to identify and use different devices and skills we've talked about in class.
This may be too long, but you asked for descriptive!

Photos Cited

Brit. “The Super Rad Socratic.” The Bits of Brit, 3 Feb. 2015, www.thebitsofbrit.com/the-super-rad-socratic/.
El Paso ISD Twitter. “Students Talking to Man in Suit and Man in Uniform.” Chapin High School, El Paso Independent School District, www.episd.org/chapin.
Iuoman. “Library.” Gettyimages, Gettyimages, www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/library-royalty-free-image/121100781.
“Man next to Bulletin Board.” Independent, The Independent Newspaper, 15 Aug. 2014, www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/let-me-ask-you-this-do-detectives-really-pin-pictures-on-a-board-when-investigating-a-crime-9667488.html.
“Teacher at Head of Class, Proudly Watching a Student Teach Other Students.” Usable Knowledge, Harvard Graduate School of Education, 20 Dec. 2016, www.gse.harvard.edu/uk/blog/students-teachers
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