Week 1 -- Triad One
Monday 10/01/12 to Friday 10/05/12, 8:00 AM- 4:00 PM
Learners and Learning:
Learning Environment
Area of Concentration: Environment
Critical Dispositions Matrix
This week’s experiences highlighted two critical dispositions related to Learning Environments:
- Teacher is committed to working with learners, colleagues, families, and communities to establish positive and supportive learning environments.
- Teacher is committed to supporting learners as they participate in decision making, engage in exploration and invention, work collaboratively and independently, and engage in purposeful learning.
Culturally Responsive Framework
Three markers related to Culturally Responsive Teaching and Learning Environments have been highlighted by this week’s experiences:
- A respect-filled learning environment where all teachers and subjects "reflect a multicultural perspective"
- Learning strategies that activate and celebrate cultural knowledge
- Enhancing meaning
Implications for Practice
The nature of my position as student-teacher is at times freeing, and at times, frustrating. I am not in charge of my own classroom. Learning to be an effective student-teacher requires a very specific and complex skill-set. The practicum experience would benefit from an entire course or workshop focused on student teaching, cooperative teaching and learning through teaching.
Over all, this was a fantastic week getting to know my urban learners! Yes, I see them being disrespectful. But, I also see them being disrespected. I see urban learners testing boundaries – and being tested. What I most notice about urban learners is their resilience!
Framework for Excellence in Urban Classroom Leadership:
- Set high standards
- Be explicit about behavior expectations and the home/ school conundrum
- Actively show respect for urban learners and for their learning
- Catch students doing something good and point it out!
- Cultural competence is a commitment to deepening understanding of one’s own cultural frames of reference, potential biases in these frames, and their impact on expectations for and relationships with diverse urban learners and their families.
