Environments are a complex interaction of physical elements, including sensory components, design and organization, aesthetics, nurturing attributes, and pedagogical resources. Research shows these elements can work together to improve early learning, self-efficacy and higher-order thinking skills.Pamela Evanshen, EdD and Janet Faulk, EdD, have developed an environmental rating scale—Assessing the Pillars of the Physical Environment for Academic Learning (APPEAL)—to help educational professionals evaluate and improve the design and use of elementary learning environments. Transform learning spaces from teacher-centered classrooms where creativity and collaboration are stifled to student-centered, developmentally appropriate learning communities where children thrive. The APPEAL rating scale is a valid and reliable assessment that quantifies six environmental domains: Meaningful Learning: occurs in a healthy, welcoming, and inviting classroom Social Learning: encourages positive learning interactions through room arrangement and seating choices Purposeful Learning: facilitates discover and active engagement through learning centers and stations, personal spaces for children, and teacher space Responsible Learning: encourages children to take ownership of their learning, be accountable for their effort, and work together to accomplish learning goals Continuous Learning: showcases children's understandings of core content knowledge Inquiry-Based Learning: project-based learning and collaborative problem solving supported by rich resources Room to Learn: Elementary Classrooms Designed for Interactive Explorations will help elementary educators completely reinvent their spaces to achieve the best child outcomes. / https://dc.etsu.edu/etsu_books/1219/thumbnail.jpg

We will share examples of hands-on investigations combining the 5Es and the CER Framework with supporting literacy activities to help upper elementary students demonstrate learning.

Teachers in rural regions need access to professional development in pedagogical skills and curriculum to improve writing of students at-risk. Presenters describe research that examined effects of professional development in two evidence-based practices. Sample teaching materials for students with diverse learning needs will be shared.

Ethnocultural minority immigrant students carry diverse histories, perspectives, and experiences, which can serve as resources for critical reflection and discussion about social conflicts. Inclusion of diverse students’ identities in the curriculum requires acknowledgement and open discussion of diversity and conflictual issues. In democratic peacebuilding education, diverse students are encouraged to express divergent points of view in open, inclusive dialogue. This ethnographic study with a critical perspective examined how three teachers in urban public elementary school classrooms with ethnocultural minority first- and second-generation immigrant students (aged 9 to 13) implemented different kinds of curriculum content and pedagogy, and how those pedagogies facilitated or impeded inclusive democratic experiences for various students. In these classrooms, peers and teachers shared similar and different cultural backgrounds and migration histories. Data included 110 classroom observations of three teachers and 75 ethnocultural minority students, six interviews with three teachers, 29 group interviews with 53 students, document analysis of ungraded student work and teachers’ planning materials, and a personal journal. Results showed how diverse students experienced and responded to implemented curriculum: when content was explicitly linked to students’ identities and experiences, opportunities for democratic peacebuilding inclusion increased. Dialogic pedagogical processes that encouraged cooperation among students strengthened the class community and invited constructive conflict education. The implicit and explicit curriculum implemented in these three diverse classrooms also shaped how students interpreted democracy in the context of multiculturalism in Canada. Teaching students as though they were all the same, and teaching curriculum content as if it were neutral and uncontestable, did not create equitable social relations. Explicit attention to conflict provided opportunities to uncover the hidden curriculum and to acknowledge structures of power and domination, creating space for development of critical consciousness. Thus culturally relevant curricula and democratic learning opportunities encouraged social and academic engagement and resulted in the inclusion of a wider range of diverse students’ voices.

This thesis is a narrative inquiry into the experiences of two childrens lives in school. I lived alongside the two children in their grade five classroom for eight months of their school year inquiring into the ways that their school experiences and their relationships with the teacher, classmates, and subject matter influenced the way they composed their stories to live by. In this thesis I share a personal reflection on the way my story to live by has been shaped by my experiences, specifically as a student, a teacher, and a researcher. I use field notes and taped conversations with each of the two boys to retell the stories they shared with me and apply them to literature and theory. I use Deweys Criteria of Experience within a narrative framework to help understand and retell the stories of the two boys as well as Clandinin, Pushor, and Murray Orrs commonplaces of narrative inquiry: place, temporality, and sociality. I explore Aokis planned and lived curriculum and Noddings ethic of care and fidelity in teaching as they applied to the inquiry.

This thesis is a narrative inquiry into the experiences of two childrens lives in school. I lived alongside the two children in their grade five classroom for eight months of their school year inquiring into the ways that their school experiences and their relationships with the teacher, classmates, and subject matter influenced the way they composed their stories to live by. In this thesis I share a personal reflection on the way my story to live by has been shaped by my experiences, specifically as a student, a teacher, and a researcher. I use field notes and taped conversations with each of the two boys to retell the stories they shared with me and apply them to literature and theory. I use Deweys Criteria of Experience within a narrative framework to help understand and retell the stories of the two boys as well as Clandinin, Pushor, and Murray Orrs commonplaces of narrative inquiry: place, temporality, and sociality. I explore Aokis planned and lived curriculum and Noddings ethic of care and fidelity in teaching as they applied to the inquiry.

Ethnocultural minority immigrant students carry diverse histories, perspectives, and experiences, which can serve as resources for critical reflection and discussion about social conflicts. Inclusion of diverse students’ identities in the curriculum requires acknowledgement and open discussion of diversity and conflictual issues. In democratic peacebuilding education, diverse students are encouraged to express divergent points of view in open, inclusive dialogue. This ethnographic study with a critical perspective examined how three teachers in urban public elementary school classrooms with ethnocultural minority first- and second-generation immigrant students (aged 9 to 13) implemented different kinds of curriculum content and pedagogy, and how those pedagogies facilitated or impeded inclusive democratic experiences for various students. In these classrooms, peers and teachers shared similar and different cultural backgrounds and migration histories. Data included 110 classroom observations of three teachers and 75 ethnocultural minority students, six interviews with three teachers, 29 group interviews with 53 students, document analysis of ungraded student work and teachers’ planning materials, and a personal journal. Results showed how diverse students experienced and responded to implemented curriculum: when content was explicitly linked to students’ identities and experiences, opportunities for democratic peacebuilding inclusion increased. Dialogic pedagogical processes that encouraged cooperation among students strengthened the class community and invited constructive conflict education. The implicit and explicit curriculum implemented in these three diverse classrooms also shaped how students interpreted democracy in the context of multiculturalism in Canada. Teaching students as though they were all the same, and teaching curriculum content as if it were neutral and uncontestable, did not create equitable social relations. Explicit attention to conflict provided opportunities to uncover the hidden curriculum and to acknowledge structures of power and domination, creating space for development of critical consciousness. Thus culturally relevant curricula and democratic learning opportunities encouraged social and academic engagement and resulted in the inclusion of a wider range of diverse students’ voices.

The purpose of this study was to analyze teacher-selected children's literature for its potential use with critical pedagogy in the elementary classroom. This multi-analytical study uses tenets from critical multicultural analysis (CMA) and components from visual analysis (VA) to guide a critical content analysis of teacher-selected children's literature. Since it is the only nationally-recognized book list solely selected by educators, the texts for this study were selected from the Teachers' Choices Reading List titles. Although prior research on teacher-selected literature for the potential use of critical pedagogy in the elementary classroom does not exist, the results of this study show many opportunities for such within the last three years of the Teachers' Choices Reading List. A discussion on these results is presented through Paulo Freire's concept of critical pedagogy, as described in three stages: critique, hope, and action. Implications for practice and research are suggested based on the results of the study.