Question for Nov. 2

We can create a community in out classrooms by allowing students to feel comfortable with each other and their teachers.  This starts from day one each year and the feelings that the students get from walking into their new room with new faces and especially a new teacher.  Good impressions and rules need to be in place from day one so that the students know where they stand and what their responsibilities are.  As teachers, we need to be consistent and organized so that our students are consistent and organized.  The sense of responsibility and independence they get will allow them to grow in and out of the classroom.  A sense of community will come from them feeling comfortable ad being able to express themselves without feeling criticized or silenced.  Open communication within the classroom will lend to the classroom becoming a community.  From Walking Trees, i have learned that if children feel that they cannot freely express themselves (appropriately), in the classroom, it will turn into a hostile and unfriendly environment.  Fletcher encourages the children in these types of environments to share their ideas with him on paper and they look forward to writing because of him.  This creates in some of the rooms a classroom that feels like a community.