The dangers of perception

I think that as teachers we all need to take time to game plan our disciplinary approaches as teachers. They need to be anti-oppressive and implemented in a fair way. I think that a lot of time our perceptions of our students often drive us into dangerous attitudes about our students and their behaviors. By relying on the perceptions that urban students in particular black males are violent and problem children then we run the risk of labeling them with a stereotype that serves no good purpose. By doing so we only continue the fear mongering that we see in the media about school violence. By taking a step back to reflect we as educators can make our own opinions about our students that are fair and accurate without using stereotypes and prejudices.

What we all need....classroom managment!!!

Our group is presenting on classroom management and effective strategies that can lead to creating a rich learning enviroment that puts a limit on distractions. I am focusing on outside sources that can be used as resources to help battle misbehavior in students, such as parents and social workers. I think we all realize by now being in UWM's education courses that teaching is not a cake walk that is full of classrooms with every student well behaved and excited about learning every day. Misbehavior occurs in a lot of classrooms and there are many strategies to limit classroom distractions that can harm all students. We will try to offer some practices and ideas that can help create great learning enviroments. Hope you enjoy it!