In order to provide students with the most effective learning experience, teachers must maintain a safe, organized, and collaborative space within the classroom. The teacher must work together with families, colleagues, and learners to create an environment that equally engages learners. The learning environment must support collaborative as well as individual learning, and provide opportunities to engage students in face-to-face, virtual, and real-life situations.
The ways in which we manage our classroom and provide a safe learning environment for all students are key to our effectiveness as educators and further, key to our students’ success. This environment encourages positive social interaction, active engagement in learning, and self-motivation.
This standard is important in ensuring that learners have a safe and creative space where diversity is valued. Students spend a lot of time in the classroom, so it is the teacher’s duty to provide a space that nurtures each individual’s needs.
Classroom Management Plan
In an internship focused on classroom management, I designed an extensive Classroom Management Plan that provides detailed information on classroom rules, procedures, and expectations. The classroom management plan is something that can be shared, discussed, and practiced with students, families, and departments. Having a set Classroom Management Plan that corresponds with the specific policies and expectations for an individual school set in place is a vital part of maintaining a healthy and safe learning environment.
All About Me Icebreakers
A healthy learning environment actively works to establish a sense of belonging amongst students. An effective teacher takes the time to get to know their students at the beginning of a schoolyear or semester. In order to foster a safe and inclusive learning environment, we must know who we are teaching. When we can find ways to connect student interest to material, we create a space where effective and meaningful learning can take place.
In order to better understand my students, I will use the All About Me activity at to get to know more about my students’ interests, hobbies, and life outside of the classroom. This is an activity that my mentor teacher uses in his own classroom as a way of getting to know his students. These can be printed out and used to decorate a wall in the classroom. Displaying student-made art and material further fosters a sense of belonging in the classroom.
Daily Warm-Ups
Incorporating a daily warm-up into each lesson is a great way to get students to shift into gear for learning. This is time for students to independently work so the teacher can take care of attendance and check-in with students. The 9th graders that I am working with during my student teaching have a writing warm-up daily. They are given a list of short, related sentences that they then must organize into a compound or complex sentence. Students have the opportunity to write their variation of the sentence on a participation board for extra credit. The students type and submit their responses into Canvas and are given points for participation.
