Classroom Environment

As teachers, we are often so bogged down in content and rigor that we fail to remember why kids come to school. An old principal of mine said it best: “Kids come to school to see their friends.” Although it was disheartening and shocking to hear at the time, she was absolutely right. My task was to figure out why. I thought about how I felt amongst friends. The following adjectives came to mind: Comfortable, safe, courageous.
With only two weeks left until Holiday Vacation, my students were feeling anything but safe, comfortable and courageous. They were not amongst friends. They were amidst stressed out students and teachers who were wrestling with too many tasks in too little of time. POL’s (Projects of Learning), a giant Exhibition of Work and Project Reflections were amongst the myriad of assignments they were trying to complete. Students became short tempered, irritable and argumentative with each other.
How could I as a teacher successfully intervene and get them feeling safe, comfortable and courageous again?



I realized I had to put them back amongst friends and uplift their spirits. I remembered this activity I took part in at Supercamp (A Summer program designed to build the academic, affective and cognitive domain of kids). The activity was quite simple. Fifteen sets of chairs were set up with each chair facing another. One student was the speaker and one was the listener. The speakers’ role was to say three SPECIFIC things they liked about the person sitting across from them. The listeners’ role was to simply say “thank you.” After a minute, they switched roles.
This seemed to be EXACTLY what my students needed. They were smiling before the activity even began! The activity served as a perfect springboard into the tougher activity we took part in next.





The next activity saw students sitting in a circle, each with a paper cup and three pretzels. One by one students were allowed to either give their pretzels to other students (if they wanted to recognize them for something), or take pretzels away (if they wanted to address an issue that has been upsetting them). The activity began benign enough with most students electing to give their pretzels away. However, a courageous student soon changed the course. Walking straight across the circle this student sat in front of her peer and admitted she was hurt by something her classmate said. The peer took it pretty well. From then on, input varied dramatically.
By the end of the activity, it was easy to see which students had positively or negatively affected other students. The students with the most pretzels in their cup clearly had an uplifting role on their classmates while the ones with few to no pretzels had a destructive role.



For the most part, I found both activities to be necessary. If I had it to do over again I might do a better job at modeling the ways to compliment classmates. Some conversations were not as rich as they could have been. I might also divide the class into smaller groups so students feel more comfortable in addressing discrepancies. Lastly, I think I might allow for a follow up activity so students could FULLY address the problems they had with each other to ensure they were adequately resolved. Otherwise, students are left to fend for themselves during the ensuing snack and lunch break which might prove even more destructive.
I have definitely seen a difference in the classroom environment because of this activity. Students DO seem more comfortable, lively and vibrant. If anything, it was a great distraction from the stress students endured for so long. They were finally “amongst friends.”