Classroom Walkthroughs

While walking through the classrooms in my school, I had one main reaction, “wow, not much has changed in the last 20 years”.  I popped into 10 classrooms and here’s what I found

·      Direct Instruction (teacher talking, kids listening)- 5/10

·      Kids working independently – 2/10

·      Discussion-  teacher led- 1/10

·      Group work-  2/10

The interesting thing about this was that this did not correlate to how the room was set up. For example, two of the five classes that had the direct instruction were set up in tables of four (which you would think would facilitate discussion or group work).  To be fair, these were quick walk-troughs and the fact that the teacher had them set up that way would indicate to me that he/she wants the kids to work in groups more often, but maybe wasn’t doing it at the exact time that I was there.  Also interesting was that the classroom discussion (led by the teacher) was set up in straight rows.  That to me didn’t seem the best way to have a room set up to facilitate discussion. 

Of the ten rooms I walked into, there was only one that really seemed differentiated and set up for cooperation.  This was a reading classroom in which they were doing guided reading.  There the teacher was working with a small group of students while rest of the class was working in centers.  This was the classroom I was most impressed with. I had heard that when you walk into a classroom, you can just tell when it feels right.  This was a good example of that.  The atmosphere was calm and quiet, there was room to work, and the students were set up in small groups in which they could talk easily and work together. 

One other point stood out to me while walking through the classrooms; accommodations for students with special needs.  Because of our AYP status, we have gotten to the point that in pretty much every classroom I walked into, there was at least two adults (a teacher and aide, two teachers, etc).  This is a great situation, but often the second adult was standing to the side, just watching the “lead teacher” do the work. There were two  exceptions to this- was in the group with the guided reading where the aide was working with a small group of students and a second classroom where the aide was redirecting students to pay attention.  

As for technology, our school is in a weird place.  We have just spent a lot of money on updated our labs and getting teachers laptops. However, the classroom computers are outdated and almost unusable.  Therefore, although there were 2-3 computers in each classroom, most were in the corner, off, and sometimes even unplugged.  There was one teacher who had a projector in his room, but the rest of the teachers were using overheads or whiteboards.  Although I think this is a problem, it is a problem that is (for the most part) out of the teachers’ hands.  Teachers do make use of the labs and try to incorporate technology into their classroom as best as they can.  One resource that is not being used is the teachers’ laptops. They see them as “theirs” even though the plan specifically called for them to be used with students as well.  They have a generic student account that could be used for students to access the internet, etc. 

         In general, I was disappointed but not surprised by the traditional (old fashioned) makeup of the classrooms.  I’m not sure what will change it, because most of the teachers in the school are younger and have been exposed to methods such as cooperative learning or centers.  I am hopeful that some of the classrooms might transform into places where more active learning occurs.