Van Poperin- Noticing Blog

This week, I wanted to blog about classroom cultural norms in my kindergarten class. My mentor teacher has, in my opinion, done a fantastic job of creating norms and community centered on respect and responsibility with our students.  Since August, we have done brainstorming and explicit instruction on how our classroom runs, discussing and developing our routines and expectations.  Specifically this included the routine for during our centers and we have dedicated much class time for the expectations during the transition times between centers.  During centers, students use a "whisper voice" and then as the timer to move to their next center goes off, they "put a bubble in their mouth" to remind themselves that we are moving quietly, stand up and clean up their center space, and move to their next center.  This Monday, after weeks of this routine's practice my mentor teacher has started group guided reading during center time (why such a clear routine for this time is important).  While this cultural norm setting was taking place, I really didn't know what to think about my mentor's strategy.  It seemed rigid and Pavlovian, but I can honestly say it worked really well in terms of achieving the goal of quiet.  Meghan's guided reading was not interrupted and the students knew what to do.