Introduction
This policy is a guide to the type of learning environment expected in a Ziauddin classroom. It provides a framework for ensuring a shared understanding of a positive and constructive learning environment consistent throughout all Ziauddin schools. Such classroom environments contribute to the values, ethos and standards of teaching expected in the Ziauddin Education System.
Aim of the Policy
Classrooms should be vibrant and welcoming, and be supportive of enriched learning. With this in mind, the classroom is considered as a learning resource used by teachers to engage students. The opportunity here is for classrooms to be places which not only create a sense of ownership for students as well as celebrating students’ learning achievements, but are themselves a useful resource for the teacher.
At ZES we aim to:
- Build students’ confidence in their work and achievements by demonstrating that we value their efforts and celebrate their learning
- Have classrooms that stimulate interest and discussion and which are a resource for challenging students’ knowledge and understanding of the world
- Encourage students’ respect of the learning environment
- Strive to make our classrooms enriched places for students’ learning
The following policy statements describe the essential elements of the ZES Classroom Organisation and Display Policy.
1. General
- Everyone in a classroom has the right to be treated with courtesy and respect, and deserves to be listened to and to contribute to everyone’s learning
- Classrooms are places where learning conversations happen. To facilitate this, teachers should engage students in structured discussion, dialogue and debate
- Everyone is on-time for classes
- Mobile phones should be put on silent or turned off except where they are being used as a learning resource in a lesson
2. The Classroom as a Resource
Classrooms are an interactive resource supporting teaching, learning and assessment. This requires thought and planning by teachers to use classrooms effectively. The classroom as a ‘resource’ in this policy includes:
- The visual (display) environment
- The learning activity organisation (e.g. tables and chairs, book and other equipment storage, ICT resources (e.g. interactive whiteboard/ EYERis) etc.
For all ZES classrooms, the following policy statements apply to ensure they are suitable as ‘learning resources’:
- All classrooms should be bright, stimulating and welcoming
- Displays (e.g. models, soft boards) need to be relevant to the students and appropriate to what they are studying
- The visual environment should celebrate student’s achievements in all areas of study, but with a special focus on students’ writing
- Soft boards should not be fixed, but should change according to theme or topic. Teachers should see the walls of the classroom as ‘working walls’ which support learning during lessons – ‘working walls’ are short-term, dynamic and well-planned
- The visual environment should include models, good examples, and information which teachers should refer to
- Students should be involved in the development of their learning environment
- The classroom should represent the learning taking place in classrooms (i.e. work in progress as well as finished work)
3. Expectations of Classroom Use
The following are minimum expectations of classroom use and lesson structure, at an appropriate level for the age of the students in the classroom:
- Learning objectives or learning outcomes, and key questions are to be displayed and referred to at the start of lessons (using, as appropriate, student’s books/ the classroom displays/ IWB/ whiteboard etc.)
- Good examples of work and ideas that are generated during lessons are displayed and referred to as a means to support relevance of learning (i.e. ‘connectedness’)
- Prompts (e.g. stimulus questions or reflection points) should be placed around the classroom which support students’ “talking and thinking about learning” (i.e. metacognition)
- The teacher should see the visual environment as an opportunity to provide a particular focus on literacy and numeracy across subject areas. For example, modelled examples of types of writing, examples of students’ writing, comprehension questions/ideas, word problems, visual models, key vocabulary etc.
- There should be an interactive element to displays in the classroom so that students can use/refer to them either during the teaching in a lesson, as an activity in their lesson or informally outside of lessons
- Interactive aspects of displays should enable students to use a range of learning styles
4. The Classroom – Using Displays to Celebrate Learning and Achievement
Students’ work should be celebrated by being displayed throughout the school. To display students’ work:
- Work displayed should be named and dated
- All work (paintings, drawing, writing etc.) should be mounted
- Captions to explain the learning process, pose questions or provide contextual information should be part of the display
- There should be a title to work which is displayed
- Where appropriate, make parts of the display three-dimensional to enhance appeal
- Students/ teachers are expected to maintain the soft boards/ display areas that are in corridors within the vicinity of the classroom
- Displays should belong to the students and not be created solely by teachers (they should be a joint effort between teacher and students)
- Colours should be chosen carefully. For example, any background mounting should complement a piece of work, not distract from it and help observers focus on the work
- Soft boards should be edged
- All teachers are expected to evaluate their classrooms and whether they are successful as learning environments. Teachers should ask: ‘Has the display worked?’ ‘Are the students using displays or talking about them?’ ‘Is it a useful tool for teaching?’ If the answer to any of these questions is negative, then the teacher needs to re-think the approach to using the classroom as a resource
NOTE: Monitoring of the implementation of this policy forms part of the lesson observation process conducted by school Principals.
5. Use of videos, audio recordings and digital resources
All ZES teachers must ensure that lessons are focused around the most productive use of learning time. Movies, movie clips and other audio-visual materials are valuable resources but they must be used to best effect.
General selection and use criteria should include the following:
- The quality of the overall recording being used should be checked
- Ensure the fair and accurate representation of facts/ principles
- Any recordings or movie clips used in the classroom should be reviewed before the class to ensure they do not include inappropriate language, depictions of violence or any inappropriate behaviour
- Showing entire movies is not allowed except with prior approval of the Principal
- Teachers should not show movie clips as a reward for good behaviour
- When such materials are used in a lesson, there should be a pre-activity and a written post-activity for students
- Teachers should ensure age appropriateness of all resources used
- Time Limitations – Teachers should be careful with the use of audiovisual materials and should weigh the value of the AV material against the instructional time it consumes
6. What Should Be Displayed and Where?
6.1 The Classroom
Each classroom should have the following display boards as a minimum requirement:
- General class notice board (for term dates, health and safety, fire evacuation etc.)
- Weekly timetable
- Working groups (e.g. for Maths, English, science etc.)
- An English ‘working wall’ – part of a wall to contain examples of current learning in context, speaking and listening prompts and high frequency words
- A Mathematics working wall – part of a wall to contain examples of current learning in context (e.g. a 100 square, number lines, place value charts etc.)
- Examples of excellent work in both English and Maths. This can be a separate soft board or part of the English and Maths working walls
- Examples of cross curriculum learning.
6.2 The Corridors
- Displays in corridors should be renewed termly (as a minimum)
- The school Principal has responsibility for the management of these display boards
6.3 Assembly/ Office Areas/ Outside/ Other Areas
All boards in these areas should be renewed termly. The Principal will ensure photographs from monthly school events are displayed
6.4 Expectations of Displays (General)
- A high quality learning environment has a direct impact on the standards and attitudes of the students in Ziauddin Schools
- Initial stimulus displays should be in place before the students return to school at the beginning of each new term. These should include some of the following:
- Key questions and key vocabulary related to topics/specific subject areas for the term
- Posters with accompanying questions to stimulate interest
- As work is generated by students, their work should be used to replace the stimulus displays created by the teachers at the start of the term
- Work should not be displayed randomly on a wall, either in classrooms or on the walls or doors in a corridor
- Displays should be maintained to ensure that they do not become tatty or ragged
- A high percentage of displayed work in classrooms should be students’ work
- Teachers should refer to displays when teaching to make meaningful links with previous learning (i.e. displays are not intended as decoration)
- Written work on display (final work) should be acknowledged and the learning intention should be clear to the audience reading it
- Emergent writing of younger students should be annotated
- Teachers are encouraged to delegate some responsibility to named students for the maintenance of the classroom and general learning environment
6.5 Expectations on Classroom Organisation
- The overall effect of the classroom should be one of space and organisation
- Do not store students’ work for an excessive time – teachers should be selective in what is kept
- Teachers’ desks should not be cluttered with resources/ paper or books
- Desks should be cleared at the end of each day to allow for cleaning
- Chairs and tables should be kept straight and tidy
- Clear routines and expectations should be established:
- Greeting students in the morning
- Teachers must always be in the classrooms to receive students after breaks