September: Building Communities in the Classroom
Building strong classroom communities encourages all students to be active participants in their learning.
By Amy Arsiwala
July 10, 2017
Teachers face many challenges in keeping middle school students participating in lessons in order to get them to become active learners. Why do we want them to participate? The education theorist Etienne Wenger has stressed that learning occurs best through social participation, and participation is the best indicator of whether or not students are paying attention.
Technology has played a role in helping to increase participation—through Kahoot, Plickers, or Google Forms, all students can be involved at the same time. Yet though students are participating through this great technology, are they active participants?
There are two types of levels of engagement—participants and active participants. A participant will respond to questions being asked in an individual context. An active participant will answer questions asked of them, but also feel part of the conversation and be in tune with the comments of their peers.
We want all our students to be active participants in the classroom. Building communities in the classroom is key to accomplishing this. Teachers build communities to promote collaboration and build relationship that foster a positive and productive working experience. The same concept applies to students.
My experiences in the past 11 years of teaching have taught me that you have to go beyond a welcoming environment in the classroom and calm nature to really build a community. Here are some helpful tips to start building a community within your classroom.
