Classroom Project

home > search > results > project

"30 students per class. 180 days to grow two reading levels. When a group of teachers get together, the usual natter goes along the lines of "really, [insert subject here], is the most difficult subject to teach!". While I fully accept and acknowledge my fellow educators (especially elementary school... MORE

"30 students per class. 180 days to grow two reading levels. When a group of teachers get together, the usual natter goes along the lines of "really, [insert subject here], is the most difficult subject to teach!". While I fully accept and acknowledge my fellow educators (especially elementary school teachers), I must proudly proclaim that teaching middle school English is the most taxing of all.

My students are at the point where they are constantly vacillating between being independent and requiring assistance. Within the state of Texas, we are recognized as a Title One school (70% or greater of are students are on free or reduced lunch), yet that label has no bearing on my instruction. I am to create independent thinkers and readers that are supportively introduced into the ways of becoming a self-sufficient learner regardless.

I have encountered many neigh-sayers, proclaiming there is no way our population, my students could be successful within a workshop classroom. I know that it is possible, however what we are currently facing is a lack of fundamental, organizational supplies that will establish the work-shop structure. Students are submitting their notebooks for assessment, yet there is no place to keep them within the classroom so they pile-up on a table in the corner which delays the individual feedback students both need and deserve. As self-directed learners they are empowered with self-evaluation. Many of their rubrics and guides on which to evaluate themselves are overlooked due to a lack of adequate space to easily display their necessary materials.

We need cogs and screws. Our big-goal is to function as well-oiled machine that is fueled by self-direction. We are in dire need of the every day items that are essential to a smooth-running classroom and yet are frequently overlooked. I can photo-copy paper after paper and create rubric after rubric to propel my students forward. However if said items are not in their correct places and are thus overlooked or discarded, it's a futile effort.

Our classroom needs magnetic work holders to display their homework for the week. With a fairly transient population, several students miss days on end without any advanced warning. Upon their return, they are lost in the abyss of missed assignments. The ability to label each day's assignment and place it so that students may access them, would be a tremendous aid. Truncating much of the in-class time spent on locating missed assignments.

We are doing lots of writing about our texts, but we have our words have no permanent home! In an effort to ensure I keep a running record of student work, I save everything. This serves as a detriment when there is no designated area to place student work!

Since I have been an educator, I have learned one of life's most vital yet socially taboo lessons: asking for help. I previously ascribed to the belief that I could do it all! I now humbly, yet proudly have learned how to ask for help. Here, and now, in this prose I am enlisting your help. We need these organizational supplies to ensure that our readers workshop is running without the mundane kinks of 'where does this go?' and 'where can I find that?' The work we are doing is so important and valuable to growing strong, self-motivated readers, it is truly detrimental to be bogged-down by logistical concerns. We are asking as a class, as a community committed to learning, please support our aspirations of becoming self-directed students so that we may become life-long readers! HIDE