In my office behind my desk I have a bunch of shelves with Funko Pop figures. There are over 60 or so on my shelf that depict all sorts of characters. I have super heroes, movie characters, Star Wars characters, video game characters and more. I started collecting them when I started in administration and my wife game me a Superman one and it just grew from there. My favorites are usually ones that have been given to me by students or staff. When I look at them I am reminded of them which helps to bring a little joy into those moments. When I am feeling particular geeky, I am usually come up with some sort of leadership or learning lesson inspired by one of them.
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Why am I mentioning this at all? Because the space you teach in can be a powerful teaching tool that often gets overlooked. I originally put it up in my office as a talking point for students. When a student comes into my office for the first time I ask them if there are any they can recognize (so far there has always been at least one) and then I have a connection to them right away that I can build on. It gives me an easy in with them right then and there. For students who have newly transferred, especially mid-year, it gives me a positive interaction with them to help our relationship get started right. It also gives me a quick tool to help with emotional regulation since I can ask students to count them, or how many have blond hair, how many are superheroes, etc. Giving them something else to focus on besides their internal thoughts can help to regulate them.
I think it is really important for teachers to have elements of themselves in their rooms. This lets students connect to them us people instead of just educators. I have taught with teachers who were die hard hockey fans and proudly display their team’s swag at every opportunity. This usually leads to solidarity from some students who go for the same team and good-natured rivalries from ones that don't. The point is, there is a connection there that is easy to tap into for students who may be unsure of how to strike up a conversation.
Using your room as a silent teaching partner is a often-overlooked tool that you can utilize. Personalization of your space helps to start a connection to do this since it isn’t hard to figure out that if you have a Star Wars poster in your room, you probably like Star Wars and would be open to talking to them about it. If you give a student nothing, then they have to go through the awkwardness of trying to figure out what their teacher likes in order to find a place of common interest. Making it easier by giving the prompts can go a long way for some students who are connection-seeking.
Other tools like visible schedules and classroom expectations can be a means of reminding and reinforcing these things for students which can save you valuable time since you don't have to continually repeat. For second language learning, things like Word Walls can augment the oral engagement to give them more interaction with the language you are trying to teach. Multiplication tables, area formulas or exponents rules can be readily accessible for students as well. World or local maps can be helpful in identifying locations and places being talked about in
Displaying student work can serve to allow students to feel ownership and belonging in the room since there are pieces of themselves there. Promoting good pieces of work (with names removed) would be an easy way to display exemplars and build that into your evaluation process. This would let students see what high quality work looks like vs low quality work. If you did a full lesson on this, you can leave them up as references and call backs to that lesson to help reinforce that learning.
The layout of the room itself will often lend itself to different sorts of activities. Rows will likely produce a different effect than paired or grouped desks, or a U-Shape. Similarly, students often behave differently when outside the classroom, or in a setting such as the lab or the gym, so moving your teaching location from time-to-time can be a positive as well.
Even something as simple as the lighting can make a difference. While dim lights may make things cozy or calm, they are also unlikely to promote academic rigour, as such, the lighting can be a cue in what you are trying to go for in a particular lesson. Perhaps you want students to be calm and listen so you dim the lights, though if you want them engaged turn them back up since they need to be able to see the page they are reading! One exception to this that I have seen is a teacher who used to turn the lights off and give the students flashlights when doing a lesson on spooky stories which was super effective at setting the atmosphere and a lot of fun for the students.
Your teaching space can signal a variety of things both good and bad as well as alter the dynamics of your classroom, so it is important to pay attention to it. There are some who would recommend starting with a blank classroom and letting students make it their own and adding things as it comes up throughout the year. I think this can be a fantastic way to build community and ownership. If you are choosing to go this way, I would suggest that you make sure that you are also a part of the building process to keep some of yourself in there as well. To make a shared communal learning space, it needs to include everyone, which means you too!
A couple of points to consider though is that the blank canvas can certainly lend itself to a group ownership, but it is also not very welcoming when they first arrive. A spartan room that is not warm and inviting can set the wrong tone if you are not careful. In addition it can be useful to have reminders and visual prompts early to help answer questions that arise, promote expectations, or review work from a previous year. In this case, a hybrid of approach may be the solution in that you can start with some core components (including some personalization), while leaving lots of space for students to add their own contributions.
For students who may be overstimulated too much will be more problematic than helpful, so be sure to be selective on the things you put up. You may also want to consider where those students sit, and what things will be in their field of vision. If it is too distracting then you can prune the extras or change where they are displayed. Another option is rotating some materials to match your teaching topic or theme, or, make 'stations' or sections of your classroom dedicated to a particular topic so if students need to use it as a tool, they can simply go to that part of the room to view it.
You and your students are going to spend a lot of time in your work space so do not miss the opportunity to use the physical plant to support your learning culture.
~ Owen
@omatchim
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