Cooperating Teacher

The cooperating teacher that I observe and help in the classroom uses many techniques to create a positive classroom environment, establish routines and offer choices to students. These techniques help the students be happy and productive in the classroom.

The teacher offers some interesting choices to her students. One of the choices is where each student chooses to sit each week. When the students come into the classroom on Monday morning they have a wide variety of seating choices. There are desks, short desks and tables that the students can choose to sit by for the week. In addition, there are chairs, cushions, balls and stools that each student can choose to use. I noticed that all of the seating options give the children a feeling of freedom, autonomy and individual choice.

Another technique that the teacher uses to support a positive learning environment is displaying the daily schedule on the board. This enables the students to see exactly what the routine will be throughout the day. I have noticed that this helps them finish tasks on time because they know when they will move on to the next activity. It also helps them work through subjects that they don't enjoy as much because they can see when the next activity will begin.

The cooperating teacher uses various rewards to encourage a positive classroom environment. She has a chart with each student’s name on a tag. The student can remove his name and move it up or down on the chart at the teacher’s request. The teacher will call out a student at any moment during the day and request that he move his name up on the chart for good behavior or down on the chart for bad behavior. Students can receive "dots" when they move up the chart and for other positive behavior throughout the day. They can trade their dots for classroom rewards such as candy or free time. I have noticed that this fourth grade class is highly motivated to earn rewards and the result has been a very positive classroom.