Mixing Up Curriculum Approach: Creating a Positive, Rewards Filled Classroom (by Julia Mixon)

My approach to teaching English, Language Arts, and Reading (ELAR) is centered on creating a safe, supportive, and engaging learning environment. As a dyslexic and ADHD individual, I remember school often being a daunting place where engaging in learning and literacy development seemed unattainable for someone like me. I maintain this lens now as an ELAR teacher for all Beginner/Intermediate Emergent Bilingual (EB) Title 1 students. At the beginning of each school year, I have been confronted with students who have a pre-existing belief that a reading classroom is not somewhere they can succeed. I believe the first step in combating this is establishing a safe and supportive classroom environment, this starts with representation. When decorating my classroom, representation of my students' cultures and interests is of the utmost importance. This is evident in my “English Hall of Fame” wall that showcases thirty-five authors, thirty-three of which are authors of color as well as my student library that features a diverse variety of reading genres at varying levels. After learning about the interests of my students at the beginning of the year, I go back and add further decor and literature that is more specifically tailored to them. At the start of the year, I also aim to lead with transparency. I do this by previewing the four units of study we will be learning throughout the year and the milestones expected of them at each point so that they are involved in the backwards planning process alongside me. Additionally, I make a point of sharing my own learning disabilities with my students to show that I also significantly struggled with reading and writing when I was in school but was still able to succeed. Following this, I continue to maintain a supportive environment by holding 1-on-1 student conferences with each of my students at the beginning, middle, and end of the year. During these meetings, I take time to get to know each of my students as an individual, assess their needs and progress in class, and set reading and writing goals with them. I have found that these meetings not only hold my students accountable to progressing in class, but also allow me to assess and adapt my way of communication and interaction with the student to best meet their needs.

After establishing a safe and supportive environment, I then begin placing emphasis on acquiring and maintaining student engagement. I first do this by minimizing confusion and frustration for my EB students. In my first year teaching, I immediately took the additional professional development and testing required to be ESL certified so that I could best support my diverse learners. In every lesson, I include visual supports on each slide and create sentence stems to accompany all written work. Additionally, I use the “OpenDyslexic” font– a font created to increase readability for dyslexic readers– on all of my classroom google slides to best support my many 504 and IEP learners. Furthermore, I make a point to incorporate hands-on activities as much as possible. This is evident at the start of every unit when I engage my students in hands-on building background activities. For example, to ignite interest in this semester’s new unit of study where students will read a historical fiction and nonfiction book about the notorious Jamestown colony, I had students spend the day rotating through four stations around the room as part of a Jamestown survival game. One station had students explore Jamestown’s remains on Google Earth, the next had them explore the hardships faced in Jamestown and challenged them to come up with a survival plan. Students then dug in sand pits to find and identify ancient artifacts used by the Native Americans and concluded their day by experimenting with colonial games and food making. It is my belief that these kinds of hands-on activities spark a joy for learning in all students. It is during these activities that I see my students think critically and work diligently without being prompted. Therefore, I make an effort to incorporate engaging activities into the daily curriculum. I do this in a variety of ways such as playing review games before every assessment, alternating between writing answers on whiteboards and handouts, utilizing engaging technology like Nearpod, and enhancing lessons with supplemental videos and graphic organizers whenever possible. I also encourage student buy-in by rewarding insightful participation with candy on a daily basis, and celebrating the top five students with the best displayed engagement, attendance, collaboration, and critical thinking skills both weekly with chips and monthly with a pizza party during lunch.

Lastly, I have learned that merely showing up each day and modeling the energy, dedication, and engagement you want to see from your students goes a long way. Studies show that students, especially middle school students, do not learn from those they cannot look up to. I take my role as a mentor and role model to these students extremely seriously. I believe that my dedication to both them and to creating a safe, supportive, and engaging learning environment is the reason why I am able to produce such significant growth and positive results.