Classroom Portrait

Outside:

The Rockbridge County High School is primarily composed of students from both the Harrington Waddell Elementary School and the Maury River Middle School due to how the Rockbridge County High School serves both Lexington and Rockbridge County areas. The school, according to the VDOE’s school quality profile, exhibits a satisfactory performance in all areas of assessment except when it comes to students with learning disabilities who are struggling with math. Moreover, the graduation rate rests at 91.5%, which is not far off from the state’s overall graduation rate of 92%. The school quality profile does, however, also reveal one of the biggest challenges that the school’s students face – economic issues. In the Rockbridge Community Profile, prepared by Jennifer Borman and Daniela Leon it states that “According to the 2013 U.S. Census, median household incomes in the Rockbridge area were significantly lower than the rest of Virginia… and the United States.” They assert that “the area is not immune from poverty” and that “poverty in Rockbridge is compounded by isolation and relative invisibility.” The Rockbridge County High School, however, as evidenced through me and my partner’s personal experience and through the statistics reviewed from the VDOE, does an excellent job at providing adequate assistance to students so as to create a conducive learning environment for everyone 

Inside: 

Mr. Simms’s and Ms. Trombetta’s classroom most certainly exhibited the same uplifting energy that permeated throughout most of the school. Upon arrival to their classroom, the students were chatting excitedly with one another, Mr. Simms, and Ms. Trombetta. This particular class certainly maintained a positive classroom culture. Moreover, the classroom definitely reflected PBL and EL principles. This was evident to me as soon as I saw the students work on the walls and, moreover, when Mr. Simms remarked to me that he allowed and encouraged his students to assist him with curating the course’s content. This amplification of student choice and voice and Mr. Simms’s practice of identifying and discussing with his students “real-world issues and problems students want to address” certainly reflect the principles of PBL and EL education. Aside from the students holding discussions with Mr. Simms, Ms. Trombetta also heavily encouraged the students to participate in class discussion and collaboration. When I inquired about how she thought it would be best to conduct a class discussion, the first thing she wrote to me was that “it’s important to let students voice their opinions while also respecting their classmates.”  Sometimes you could feel the energy of the classroom shift throughout the class. There was one moment where they did an activity on the board and everyone was excited for it, but once they sat back down it slightly turned into a lecture that the students didn’t necessarily feed into. All in all, the class could reap the benefits of PBL further down the line.

 This course was an interesting one to say the least. It was filled with headache, long nights, and a lot of emails but it was worth it. It gave me the opportunity to analyze and reflect on my education system growing up and what i realized is that the State of Virginia has and is continuing to fail its students and teachers by requiring the same broad, general, and shallow information to be taught throughout the years. I also discovered that Expeditionary Learning is an interesting tool to use to connect with students. For it to work fully, it must be introduced at a younger age to avoid resentment. For instance, in my observation of Mr. Simms 10th grade class at Rock Bridge High School, the students did not always partake in the open discussions. Leaving the teacher to lead the class in the discussion and slowly turning the open discussion into a lecture. Another way to reach the students rather than starting the Expeditionary Learning process earlier, is to step outside the comfort box as an educator and try to form a deep connection to each student. For example, I was watching “Freedom Writers” and Mrs. Gruwell, or Mrs. G, began to take an initiative to connect with her students on a deeper level than the general teacher would. She gave them notebooks and told them to write whatever they are feeling in them and if they wanted her to read it to leave it in the room storage closet for her to read. This seems so minuscule and small, but it led to the students responding and respecting her as a teacher because she went out of her way to connect with each student. Going off of that, some EL principles I will continue to spread and embody are “Diversity and Inclusion” and “Empathy and Caring” not because I want to see the world become a better place, but because these are the basic principles to live by. I am not just focusing on color diversity either, but diversity in the mind as well. If we could focus more on these two core principles our education system could change.

Thank you.