Activity 3.2: Observing Teaching.

Part 1: The sorts of things I may expect to see in inclusive classroom at the basic education level

1.     Supportive learning environment 

The teacher treats all students respectfully; conveying respect and caring toward students using positive language with students, including praise and encouragement; prompt and appropriate response to students’ needs with fairness and justice; no gender bias and gender stereotypes in the classroom;

2.     Positive behavioural expectations 

Setting positive behavioral expectations in the classroom by setting clear behavioural expectations for classroom activities and communicate same clearly to the students;; acknowledging positive student behavior by responding positively to the students when they show that behavior (e.g., praise such as giving students a thumbs up of acknowledgement); focusing more on the expected behaviour, rather than the undesired behavior by using disruptions in the classroom as opportunities to explicitly communicate behavioral expectations.

3.     Lesson facilitation

(i) Develop clear and specific learning objectives for the lesson and communicate the learning objectives to the class; and (ii) relate classroom activities to the objectives; (iii) checking for understanding of previous lesson before moving to the next; (iii) giving feedback to help clarify students’ misunderstandings or identify their successes; and (iv) encouraging students to think critically by asking open-ended questions and providing students with thinking tasks that require them to actively analyse content; (v) being actively involved with the lesson (e.g., work through the problem step-by-step with the students).

4.     Checks for understanding

Determine students’ level of understanding of the learning material through questions, prompts or presenting new material in small steps and checking student understanding by having students practice after each step; monitor what students are doing rather than wait passively until students have finished with the activity before they check for students’ understanding; adapt curriculum materials based on the knowledge of student’s characteristics and achievement – this is not so easy as teacher needs to be  skilled at both recognizing and adjusting to students’ individual and collective needs, and have the ability to teach to the varying levels of the student (better known as differentiated instruction) by being able to decipher what a learner can do without guidance and what she/he cannot do

5.     Feedback

Give effective feedback must be instructive, timely, referenced to the actual task, and focused on what is correct and what to do next; detect and highlight errors, as well as respond to them appropriately (i.e., never criticizing students); when students provide an incorrect answer, the teacher should help the student identify the root of their misconception before moving on to a new topic; provide specific prompts and questions to encourage student’s growth mindset by helping individual learners identify what success looks like and ways to do even better in the future.

6.     Critical thinking 

Help students to critically analyze content by asking open-ended questions that require reasoning, explanation, or generalization or have more than one correct answer; provide thinking tasks such as small group debates, group critical thinking tasks under timed pressure, posing controversial questions about a topic followed by a discussion at the end of class, and responding to critical thinking tasks through short answer questions.

7.     Autonomy – may be chaotic

Creating opportunities for students to take ownership of their own learning, (i.e., provide students with the opportunities to make their own meaningful choices) (e.g., establishing classroom rules, choosing assignment deadlines; allowing students to choose their own paths toward a solution, justifying their claims with evidence, establishing their own personal learning goals; and allowing students to have some choice in how they present their work (e.g., preparing a written report versus a brochure, choosing materials to use in an assignment); provide students with opportunities to take on roles in the classroom such as cleaning up after an activity or leading the students in some aspect of a lesson, taking attendance; At the secondary education level, teachers can also assign roles that relate to real school problems that need resolving (e.g., peer mediation to deal with school bullying); establish a supportive classroom environment in which all students are comfortable and willing to generally volunteer their answers in class

8.     Perseverance 

Encourage students to persevere through learning challenges by acknowledging students’ efforts - rather than focusing only on results, students’ intelligence, or natural abilities, giving praise that acknowledges student effort toward mastering new skills and identifies these efforts explicitly, thus encouraging a growth mindset; empathize with students having challenges in some subjects; and, encourage students to set goals for their learning.

9.     Social and collaborative skills 

Encourage positive interactions with peers of the same age; promote students’ interpersonal skills; facilitation of programs designed to teach emotion knowledge and regulation; Students collaborate with one another through peer interaction will engender less bullying.

Part 2: Which one is the most difficult to define?

Autonomy – may be chaotic

Creating opportunities for students to take ownership of their own learning, (i.e., provide students with the opportunities to make their own meaningful choices) (e.g., establishing classroom rules, choosing assignment deadlines; allowing students to choose their own paths toward a solution, justifying their claims with evidence, establishing their own personal learning goals; and allowing students to have some choice in how they present their work (e.g., preparing a written report versus a brochure, choosing materials to use in an assignment); provide students with opportunities to take on roles in the classroom such as cleaning up after an activity or leading the students in some aspect of a lesson, taking attendance; At the secondary education level, teachers can also assign roles that relate to real school problems that need resolving (e.g., peer mediation to deal with school bullying); establish a supportive classroom environment in which all students are comfortable and willing to generally volunteer their answers in class

Part 3:  In a critique of the tool, Rafael Mitchell (2019) argues that inclusive education requires teachers to pay attention to how students are organised, and recognises the fact that peer support is important in supporting disadvantaged students. He says that the ‘tool’ should include this aspect of classroom organisation. Drawing on your own experience:

Do you agree with this critique and why?

I agree partially because what is captured by the tool was focused on primary classes without considering at least, lower secondary being part of basic education.    

However, one of the main areas of the framework the tool is based on is Time on Task – i.e., Time on learning. Teach has included ‘keeping students on task’ as an observable teacher behaviors to maximize time on learning in the classroom. Teachers who keep students on task also tend to have better classroom organizational skills overall, better behavioral management skills, and spend more time on classroom instruction.

Part 4: How might you modify this tool to focus more effectively on the inclusivity of the classroom? Write your thoughts in your study notebook, or , if possible, discuss your ideas with a colleague.

To modify this tool to focus more effectively on the inclusivity of class, I will do more research on what happens at the secondary classrooms and include in the framework what relevant factors for inclusivity at the secondary school level.