Classroom Environmental Philosophy

a) Introduction (Provide an overall general philosophy statement about your classroom

and context for this plan (i.e., level of students, subject area, etc.).) You could include
what your philosophy of dealing with disruptive behavior, creating a community, etc.
My classroom will be a high school freshman biology class. These students will be new
to learning in a structured setting and will need guidance to help them succeed in their first year
at a new school. I plan to create a safe and friendly learning environment by getting to know
each student personally. I will strive to have my students know each other well, often working on
projects together and helping each other when appropriate. I will engage the students in activities
that teach them biological knowledge while also providing them with study tools and strategies
that they can implement throughout the rest of their high school careers. These strategies may
include games like kahoot, organizing notes, or making useful flashcards.
When disruptive behavior arises in my classroom, I will deal with it in a calm yet
disappointed matter. I want the students to understand that I hold the same level of respect for
them that I hope they hold for me. I want my classroom to be a safe and inclusive space, and
disruptive behavior could disturb this ideal. I will not tolerate disrespect in my classroom; when
students are talking, I expect their classmates to listen diligently and hear what they have to say.
To make my classroom more inclusive, I will make it clear that I see the differences between
each student and celebrate the diversity within my classroom. I will not be colorblind and strip
my students of their identities, but rather use my students’ varying backgrounds to our advantage
in the classroom.
In my future classroom, I plan to utilize classroom diversity to my advantage. In order to
do so, I need to recognize that not all students share the same perspectives. As Carol Tomlinson
stated in her article “Teaching for Excellence in Academically Diverse Classrooms,”
“Effectively supporting success for diverse learners calls on teachers to be students of their
students.” As an educator, I will be prepared to have students with different knowledge bases
than I myself have. I plan to learn from my students and use their diverse experiences to expand
upon the topics within my classroom. It has been brought up in an article titled “Preparing for
Culturally Responsive Teaching” that many educators are not explicitly knowledgeable about
different cultures, making them unequipped to teach their diverse student body to the best of
their ability. I will strive to become educated on my students’ backgrounds in order to provide
them with the best education possible. Both of these readings influenced my approach to
teaching a culturally diverse classroom; I want to recognize the differences between my students
and celebrate them rather than ignoring them.
Dr. McLeod influenced my approach to education with the information she presented in
her article “3 Ways to Identify and Survive a Culture of Deficit Thinking.” Deficit thinking can
be described as the misconception that marginalized and racialized students will not be as
successful within the school system due to cultural barriers and ability levels. As a future
educator, I want to provide the best education possible to all of my students. I will strive to be
aware of any biases I hold, and work to rid myself of any way of thinking that could prevent me
from being the best teacher possible to a diverse classroom.
I also plan to utilize higher level critical thinking within my classroom, which I believe is
well illustrated within Bloom’s Taxonomy. The different levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy are
described in detail within “A Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching, and Assessing.” I appreciated
that this article used verbs to describe how each level of Bloom’s Taxonomy could be
implemented. I plan to use the knowledge I gained from this article to plan my future lessons and
set goals for the level of critical thinking my students should reach during the lesson.

b) 5 Belief Statements about your Classroom Environment (Describe the statement in

more detail: What this belief will ‘look like’ in your classroom? In other words, if I
walked into your classroom what would I see that ‘shows’ me this belief in action?)

1) I believe that young minds are impressionable

I plan to teach my students how to care and respect themselves through example. I believe the
students often mimic the way the adults in their lives act because they are extremely
impressionable while they are growing. I will lead with a strong example, being confident in my
knowledge and showing my students that its okay to make mistakes and to ask questions when
information is unclear. Within my classroom, I will make sure to lead by example by
exemplifying higher-order critical thinking skills. When asking my students to create, I will
create as well. I want it to resonate with the students that these exemplified in Bloom’s
Taxonomy will be useful throughout their lives, not just in the formal classroom.

2) I believe kindness can make a huge difference

I plan to make sure every person in my class feels appreciated and adequate. I may implement
“feel-good fridays” in my class where students receive compliments from their classmates about
any topic matter. Forming this compassionate connection between my students will make the
environment a safe space for learning and self discovery. In order for my classroom to be safe, it
also needs to be inclusive. Diversity will be celebrated; I will do my best to effectively support
my diverse classroom of students, each with a different knowledge base and life experience. I
will educate myself on the various cultures of my students and be prepared to learn from my
students fresh perspectives.

3)I believe disability does not mean inability

I will not allow any student to feel inadequate due to disabilities, whether they be physical or
mental or any other form. All children are capable of doing amazing things in and out of the
classroom; however, it can be difficult for students to succeed without a level of confidence. I
will ensure all of my students that they can succeed and offer them any help they may need. I
find it inspirational that many students live with difficulty and rarely allow anything to get in the
way of their dreams. I will use this inspiration as fuel to create the best environment possible for
my students.

However, I will not ignore the disabilities of my students. I will not pretend to be blind to the
differences between my students, but rather show them all that I am confident in their abilities
regardless of the way society tends to classify them. I believe a lot of the misconceptions society
has about these students stem from a deficit mindset. I will not allow this common
misconception to skew my view of my students’ potential.
4)I believe students learn from doing
Labs and interactive activities make information easier to visualize and grasp, as well as make
class fun and exciting. Students can expect to walk into class most days to find some level of
interactive activity. This may be from group warm-up projects or weekly lab experiments. The
energy in the class will be evident as soon as you walk in. There will be curiosity and excitement
in the air regarding what the activity of the day will be.
In order to complete these activities, students will need to develop and utilize critical thinking
skills. As opposed to passive learning which requires only the lower levels of Bloom’s
Taxonomy (remembering and understanding), these projects will require students to analyze
information, evaluate the subjects they are being presented with, and create products related to
the new information they have learned.

5)I believe music aids focus

In my personal experience, I find that I do my best work while listening to music. However, I am
aware that all my students will have different music tastes. When doing independent work, I will
allow my students to listen to their own music. While doing group work or interactive
assignments, I will put on a playlist that the whole class collaborated on during the first week of
school. This may help some students focus, but will also add a fun interactive component to the
classroom environment