I chose to feature my own classroom. This is a space that I see as being conducive to creativity, my creativity as well as for my students. I will often have students who I don’t even teach pop in to my room and say “Oh my gosh, I love your classroom”, even teachers who stop by to talk will mention how “cute” it is. So how does “cute” translate to “engaging” and “useful”? Well, the way I would describe my classroom would be cozy, particularly when I plug in the twinkle lights & lamps and turn the overhead lights off. It just feels inviting & warm as opposed to concrete and drab. Cozy could easily lead people to believe that perhaps rather than students feeling motivated & engaged they actually feel relaxed and laid back, lazy even. But what cozy can mean, and in my case I believe that it does, is comfortable and how can we be creative and engaged if we feel uncomfortable? When I work on assignments for my masters I need to be comfortable before I can really focus on my work at hand. I think the same thing is true for me and my students in my classroom. Students feel welcome in my room, and that gives them a sense of comfort, and that sense of comfort can lead to them letting their guard down to really engage themselves in the content.
For me personally, my classroom allows creativity as I plan because I am inspired by the students I can visualize in my classroom, in my space where I am living my dream of being a teacher and making an impact on students. Being able to make my classroom my own, making it comfortable and cozy and “cute”, all that allows me to do my job better.
For me personally, my classroom allows creativity as I plan because I am inspired by the students I can visualize in my classroom, in my space where I am living my dream of being a teacher and making an impact on students. Being able to make my classroom my own, making it comfortable and cozy and “cute”, all that allows me to do my job better.
I can learn a lot from this article. I like to have control in my classroom, this is probably from three years of working with a much more challenging population in Detroit, I had to feel in control more than anything. The slightest alteration irks me and must be corrected immediately. Is my classroom conducive to creativity? Maybe. Maybe not. I think my classroom is warm and inviting and I think THAT means it can be conducive to creativity. But the idea of setting my classroom up a particular way and then allowing its users (my students) to make it their own is something that could be revolutionary to my teaching style. So what I can learn from this article, what I have learned is that I need to let go a little when it comes to the operation of my classroom. Not to say that I don’t think of my students when I set up the desks, whether I decide to put them in groups of four, traditional rows, or a u-shape. However, allowing them to figure out what would work best for them could make a world of difference. And that doesn’t just apply to where they sit or how they sit, it applies to how they exist within my classroom.