21st Century Classroom Design

This was a project I wrote with two of my fellow students.

21^st Century Classroom Design

The twenty-first century classroom is one that should be infused with technology and yet still open to other types of creativity. Though technology has changed some components of the classroom there still should be structure and order to learning. Thus, this is the twenty-first century classroom.

When you first walk into our room, you notice how bright and cheerful it is. It is a warm inviting classroom that is spacious with corners devoted to the different subjects that are taught. These corners also have a specific color designated for each specific subject. To the left is the learning center area. Here there would be a learning center that correlates with a featured lesson of the week. For example, the class is now studying and growing plants therefore the learning center is about photosynthesis. Next to the learning center area is the portable laptop cabinet. Underneath the storage of the laptops there are two colored printers for the children to print their various activities that they worked on at the laptops. Unless the growing plants, the sink and the fish aquarium do not give enough evidence what the next area of the classroom is, open up one of the multiple green cabinets and explore the various science materials and experiments. This is the perfect place for the science area because of the light that shines from the windows that run along the left wall of the room. In addition to these windows, we have three skylights and a bay window that gives natural light for our blue reading corner. The reading corner is a comfortable and relaxing place to read because of the beanbags and many available books to read. There is also a rocking chair for the teacher to sit in while reading to the class. The secluded feel of the part of the room makes it ideal for accelerated reading, tutoring purposes and various reading groups. Another feature of the reading corner is the comfortable bay window with the cushioned window seats. Though this corner is designated to reading, at the bay window is a telescope used to observe weather patterns.

To assist the teacher in classroom management, we have included a restroom in the back right corner. Next to the restroom is the math corner. Featured in this corner are three large round tables with chairs that are good for working in small groups and using manipulatives. These tables are also useful for group collaboration that encourages critical thinking skills in any subject. Another feature of the math corner are the large cabinets used for storing the manipulatives and other supplies. Above the cabinets is a bulletin board used for the problem of the week. The color of this corner is yellow!

Separating the student and teacher work areas and the learning center areas is a large mounted television and DVD player. This television can be viewed from almost every area of the classroom. This source of technology can be used to watch educational videos which are stored in a cupboard underneath the television. There is also a stereo, CD’s and various educational DVDs. One neat aspect of this television is that it can be hooked up to the teacher’s computer to show videos and other resources from the internet.

Next to the television is a white board used for teaching purposes. Above the white board is a large pull-down projector screen. The projector is mounted in the center of the room behind the student’s desks. There is also an overhead on a cart that is stored next to the teacher’s desk. Both of these can be used for projecting worksheets, power points, spreadsheets, digital pictures and various activities.

The students are seated at individual desks facing the white board. These desks are aligned two rows of desks in groups of five. Students are seated at individual desks so they can have their own personal space and for the storage of their own supplies. This also provides privacy for test-taking. It is also easy to arrange the class into groups.

The teacher’s desk in this classroom is equipped with a computer and a printer for lesson planning, recording grades, researching and for class projects that can be projected. Next to the desk is a file cabinet used for keeping student records, tests, quizzes and other supplies. There is also a bulletin board behind the desk that has a different theme each month and for activities and announcements.

Our classroom is nearly completed with only component remaining. Next to the door each student is individually assigned a divided cubby. One side is for their book bags and the other side for paper work such as homework and newsletters and extra supplies. Along the side of the cubbies are pegs for the student’s coats and other personal belongings such as lunch bags.

As you can see from the design of our classroom, we have merged the traditional classroom with a learner-active, technology infused classroom. The teacher in this environment not only teaches in lecture form but is able to direct group learning and critical thinking projects because of the different technology and hands on features of the room. This classroom is conducive for interpersonal and intrapersonal learners.

Microsoft Excel in the Classroom

Before last summer, I had no idea what Excel even was. I started playing with it as a part of my job and when I started working for Dr. Burch again this fall, I became very familiar with the program. and I have experienced first-hand the benefits of using this program for academic purposes. When I think of hours typing numbers in the computer and averaging over and over again, I am so happy that I can now do the same amount of work in less than half the time it used to take.
Excel programs are very beneficial in the classroom for the teacher (saving time) and the students (helping them enjoy numbers and learning exciting technology skills).
Excel is very helpful for the teacher in keeping track of any type of grading system and anything that needs averaging. One idea that I thought would be very helpful is to have the students keep track of their reading on an Excel Worksheet. The students can keep track of the book title, author, number of pages, AR level, and AR test results. Allowing the student to accomplish the task, gives them the opportunity to observe their growing excellence and a sense of achievement. Because the students are keeping track of their books, they can look back at all they have read as a reading log and the teacher can look at the worksheet and assess the students improvement. http://www.microsoft.com/education/read.mspx
Another idea I would like to incorporate into my classroom someday is using Excel to teach my students graphs and how graphs are used in the real world. Because information put into a data spreadsheet can very easily be turned into a graph (and multiple variations of graphs), the students can read their data on the worksheet then correlate that information with what they read on the graph. This type of data compilation is excellent for recording real time and real life data in the classroom. And an asset for students in the 21st century classroom to learn.
http://www.microsoft.com/education/read.mspx

Digital Cameras in the 21st Century Classroom

Using the digital camera in the elementary classroom has its uses in many different avenues, rather than just for use as integrating technology. Digital cameras can be used for communicating to parents, making lessons exciting, keeping track of class projects, and a variety of other ways. Because students enjoy viewing themselves through a camera lens, projected on a screen, or online, digital cameras are great tools to make the 21st century classroom a fun environment for learning.
Below is a list of ten of my favorite ways to use the digital camera in an elementary classroom:
1. Learning about Colors - As you are studying colors, have the students walk around the classroom, school or outside taking pictures of the color that you are studying. These pictures may be inserted into a PowerPoint Booklet, called for example, "Things That Are Blue". If you don't want many slides, insert more than one picture on the slide. The students may include their voice and tell you what the name of the picture. (http://www.hardin.k12.ky.us/res_techn/TEC/digitalcamera/primary.htm)
2. A Book About Me - I use my digital camera to take pictures of my first and second grade special needs students to use in books. First we decide what we want to write, then we take pictures of the children. With lower level children using the digital camera and making their own books is very exciting, for some it is a key difference in learning to read. They love to read books about themselves, especially with their own photos. (http://www.brunswick.k12.me.us/lon/lonlinks/digicam/teacher/home.html)
3. Learning about the Senses - Arrange students into groups and assign each group one of the five senses. Have each group photograph the appropriate sensory organ and then have them take pictures of objects that organ might best perceive. (http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech/tech148.shtml)
4. Nouns - Make a Proper Noun--Common Noun publication. The students are to find a picture of something that is a common noun and then find its companion, the proper noun. Place the pictures side by side and label each. This could also be done with nouns or verbs. Make a slide presentation of VERBS in ACTION or NOUNS HANGING AROUND SCHOOL. (http://www.hardin.k12.ky.us/res_techn/TEC/digitalcamera/primary.htm)/
5. Draw Youself - Snap a black-and-white headshot of each student, size it to ¼ page, and place a box frame around it. Place a blank box the same size as the framed picture beside it. Have students draw ½-inch to 1-inch gridlines in pencil in both boxes and label the gridlines 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and so on in each direction. Then have students try to duplicate their pictures by drawing only what they see in each grid. (http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech/tech148.shtml)
6. Geometric Shape Walk - Assign pairs of students to walk through the school to find such examples of geometric shapes as circles, triangles, parallel lines, obtuse angles, and so on. Label each photo and create a geometry book. (http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech/tech148.shtml)
7. Symbols in My Town - Would be interesting to create a SYMBOLS publication: stop sign, handicap, flag, American eagle, Ladies(Men)Restroom, etc. How many symbols do we have in our school; our neighborhood, community?(http://www.hardin.k12.ky.us/res_techn/TEC/digitalcamera/primary.htm)
8. Portraiture - This was part of a series of portraiture projects. With this particular project, students: 1. used digital cameras to take their pictures 2. brought these pictures into a graphics program where they could manipulate the layout, color, special effects. etc. 3. scanned in or took digital shots of other pictures, poems, objects of meaning to them 4. imported these symbols into their portraits and layered their image with items of meaning to create a collage effect. 5. final products were then uploaded to the Cyberfaces web site at http://www.cyberfaces.org/ 6. final products were also printed on a color banner and placed into a slide show to display at open house, parent-teacher nights, etc. 7. students were then asked to write brief essays about their creation process, explaining their use of color, objects, words, etc. for interpretation.
This could very well evolve into part of an interdisciplinary unit.(http://www.brunswick.k12.me.us/lon/lonlinks/digicam/teacher/home.html)
9. When I Grow Up - Photograph students dressed up as what they want to be when they grow up and use the pictures to illustrate career reports. (http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech/tech148.shtml)
10. Class Reminders - Take pictures of class procedures and display them in the classroom as a reminder. (http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech/tech148.shtml)

Integrating Technology

Integrating technology into the daily classroom does not seem as intimidating to me as it once did. Looking through the 21st century skills and technology standards, many of the skills that the students must learn and practice go hand-in hand with the State Standard Objectives. I think there are many ways to integrate technology into any classroom. The teacher simply needs to equip the students with the knowledge they need to complete the tasks (and understand why they are completing the task) and the teacher needs to be well equipped herself/himself. The way the West Virginia State Department set up the technology standards makes it quite easy for the teacher to integrate technology into the lesson. Plus, several technology standards can fir into one lesson or unit plan.
As a teacher in the 21st century, I know that I will desire my students to have access to computers on a daily basis. I realize that in some schools this is not possible, but to make the classroom as much like a real-world situation, using the internet or Word processing on a daily basis is very realistic. I would like my students to have the opportunity to collaborate with students in another classroom. Even if this mens that my students communicate with the class next door or on the other side of the world.
Because I desire my students to be exposed to technology on a daily basis, this means that I may have to have several small projects goin on at the same time. In the las blog, I posted about the learner-active, technology-infused classroom. In such classrooms, the students do not necessarily complete the project in one day or one week, however, several of the projects spanned months or the entire school year. Now these activities would have to be pretty exciting for the students to stay interested that long, but when the students are using technology and working together, the activities usually are pretty exciting!
As for lesson plans that integrate technology; I imagine that I will need to be very clear where I desire my students to focus on technology and where pencil and paper will suffice. Though technology is a large part of our lives today, there is still room for good old work sheets and seat-work. From the lesson plans I have already written that integrate technology, writing the lesson plan with the integration is not that difficult, but actually applying that integration in clear step-by step process will be very important.

A Learner-Active, Technology Infused Classroom

Wow! Learner-active, technology-infused classrooms are most likely busy and exciting classrooms. I can see that such a class would have to have a well-organized teacher who has exposed his/her students to enough technology in order to complete the lesson without distracting from the main point of the lesson.
Though these lessons could be rather time-consuming (depending on the student's base knowledge of technology), I can definitely see the benefit they would be to each student in the class. Especially because each lesson covers so many learning styles.
A learner-active and technology-infused classroom takes the basics of learning and teaches the student through real-life experience in the classroom and outside of the classroom- by using technology to explore other cultures and regions, or collaborating with another classroom. This kind of classroom infuses 21st century skills into every day learning. The students learn to use manipulatives and real-life examples to solve-problems and to take what they are learning in school at apply it to their world.
I looked over a few unit plans at the site:http://educate.intel.com/en/ProjectDesign/UnitPLanIndex/GradeIndex/#1 and I was very impressed with the clarity of instruction (yet flexibility) and the way the day-to-day lessons did not appear overwhelming (for the teacher and the student).
One unit that I read and thought was very clear in showing a technology-infused and leaner-active classroom was the 'The Great Bean Race.' In this lesson the students are able to be active through the growing of bean plant as teams in the classroom. The students not only learn how to plant and take care of a plant, they also get the joy of every day watching and reporting the growth and maturity of their plant. The students use technology by reporting the growth of their plants with students living in other regions and through reporting the growth of their plants in a newsletter. The students learn in the ares of science, math, and language arts in this lesson by watching and measuring their plant's growth as well as communicating the growth and results of the experiement. This unit is also exciting because it is a race. Who's bean plant will grow to be the tallest?

Welcome to My Blog

My name is Sarah Cole and I am a Junior studying in the Elementary Education/ Bible program at Appalachian Bible College. God placed the desire in me to serve Him full-time several years ago. Since then, He has shown me that teaching well is a very effective ministry that can be used in my own backyard or around the world. He then led me to study His Word at a Bible college in New York for two years, and now His will is for me to study and serve at ABC. My prayer for after I graduate is to live in a foreign country and teach as a ministry. I would not even have to teach children (though that would be my preference), but simply having the opporunity to serve God through educating someone would be a blessing to me. I have a desire to serve in East Asia, but God may lead me to a different place. It is all in His capable hands.
Because I grew up homeschooled, I always was curious about the schools that my friends went to. Two of my grandparents were teachers and I remember the first time I sat in my grandmother's second/third grade classroom, I knew that teaching was what I wanted to do. Now, years later, I see the impact God allowed my grandparents to have on so many lives. I desire to have an impact like that, even if God uses me to impact only a few people.
I think that technology will influence the way that I teach because, especially when I serve in another country, it will allow my students to connect with different cultures and they can learn about the systems and operations in the United States. Technology will also give me the opportunity to prepare my students for living in a 21st century skill driven world. Therefore, if I have the means available, I will incorporate technology into my lessons as much as possible, in a way that does not distract from what the class is learning.