They will become what you believe they are. This is the philosophy of my 21st century classroom. I plan on incorporating a partial flipped classroom. Using the two combined philosophies, my future classroom will be a student-based, learning environment where communication and collaboration are the key components to a successful education.
My classroom promotes communication, as demonstrated by the graphic representation of the classroom. There are multiple smartboards in the classroom, with student desks grouped in such a way as to allow open expression of ideas. Furthermore, these groups are based on ability level, which is an important aspect of the flipped classroom. Another valuable aspect that my 21st century classroom promotes is collaboration. Since students are grouped by ability levels, they are highly encouraged to collaborate with each other. That way, they understand the material by talking and learning from their peers. Thus, they increase their communication skills while simultaneously having to collaborate with their peers and express what they learned to the group. Lastly, my 21st century classroom actively involves students in their learning process. Following the flipped classroom method allows for me as a teacher to shift responsibility over to the students by acting as more of a guide than an absolute disseminator of knowledge. Instead of a traditional classroom, I can separate the class into individual groups and focus on certain areas of the lesson with each group. As i explain the material to the students, it is their responsibility to collaborate with their group members to correctly solve practice problems assigned to them. This method of grouping and transferring responsibility creates a basis of student centered learning that individualizes the education process to better fit each student.
Every day, students will come in the classroom, assess themselves, and sit at a desk according to how well they feel that they know the material. From there, I go around and check to see how well my students grouped themselves. Students then discuss the material among themselves, answering the questions that they came up with from watching the videos that I created.
Did i mention that my classroom is a flipped classroom? Students are assigned videos and resources that I create or link them to and they use these links to familiarize themselves with the content prior to coming to class. This gives me as the teacher the opportunity to use a teaching technique revolving around questions that arise.
The rest of the class time will be used to practice and learn the material more thoroughly. I will spend time at each group as they need further instruction or answers to questions that they are struggling with. Each group will be assigned practice problems by their ability level, and some may involve students using a smartboard to test their understanding. As for accessibility, I will personally take it upon myself to make sure that students have time and access to needed technologies. If I have students who lack internet access, I will adapt my instruction to match their needs. This might mean simply allowing them access to a computer during school hours or it might mean printing out a packet for them to reference. In the extreme case, it might force me to completely change my teaching style to revolve more around the traditional classroom, which still has its advantages: SEE HERE. It all depends on what serves as the best way for each student in my classroom to learn.
If a student doesn't do their homework for whatever reason, I will allow them access to a computer during class time to catch up. If it becomes a habit, discipline or adaptation will ensue.
Here is an average lesson topic in a chapter on percents. To teach this lesson, the routine defined above needs to be set. Starting with the homework I would assign for my students to begin understanding the concept, my video would look something like this or this. Further resources that I would encourage them to look at would include: Open Study , My wikispace, which would look something like my high school geometry teacher's wikispace , Percentage Game , and of course, a review from previous lessons in the chapter, where topics such as the basics of percents 1 and 2. were taught. I would keep a listing of these resources on an open educational resource such as OER Glue.
After students have become familiar with the lesson, they come to class ready to learn. They group themselves by ability level with the concept of percentages above 100 or below 1. I make sure that these groups are based on ability levels and not on friendships. Now the lesson becomes more individualized. I go around helping each group with any questions that came up during the homework session. Moreover, I assign each group varying difficulty levels of practice work. If students are ready, I allow them to look ahead or discover deeper levels of practice. This could vary from having them define percents in their own words to writing practice worksheets for their peers to use. At the end of the day, if i deem that every student is adequately ready for the chapter test, I give them a quiz on the lesson and give them practice quizzes on the chapter that they can take. During the next class there would then be the test on the chapter.
My assessments include your general rubric and grading techniques. All of my tests and quizzes will be on paper and physically taken in the classroom. The true aspect of my grading, however, will reflect effort and understanding of the material.
INSIDE THE CLASSROOM
SEE MY BLOG POST I already discussed some ways of connecting students to each other and to me. The main tools that I will use inside the classroom to keep in touch with my students, however, are: OER Glue, Wikispaces, Blogger , and any resources that the school district specifically uses such as Penncrest.org.
These resources allow me to keep a listing of resources that will be available for my students to access, an organized collection of homework and lesson content, a way for my students to contact me at any time for both educational reasons and any other reasons that they need my help or advice with, and a place that allows students to access details about their grades and progress in my class.OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM
Connecting outside of the classroom to other professionals and allowing for students to develop communication outside of the local community has its advantages and disadvantages. Resources such as Facebook and Twitter can be useful, but they take dedication on the part of the user. My students won't have the time or dedication to develop anything remotely useful during the year that they attend my class. So, I need to look at other resources that allow them to globally contact other students just like them. Similarly, for both their use and mine, I will incorporate communication with experts in math and education. Forums such as ePals allow for students to openly express themselves and post their opinions about subjects that their global peers post about. It also allows collaboration on similar subjects, in my case: Math. Other forums such as Ask Dr. Math allow students to ask questions of and communicate with educational and math experts rather than their peers. The development of personal learning networks allows for more in depth communication and collaboration, but it takes even more time and dedication than facebook and twitter to obtain one.
PUBLISHING STUDENT AND TEACHER WORK
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