TWS 1 The sixth grade classroom lies on the sixth grade hall at Westview Middle School.

The classroom happens to be the very last classroom on the right. Upon entry, there is a colorful board filled with expectations, rules, and the daily schedule. The Promethean board is situated between two white boards. On the right side of the Promethean board, there is a weekly schedule with homework and what is due written on it. To the left of the Promethean board, the American flag is hung with all of the students lunch cards on it. The white board to the left of the Promethean board always has the date on it. In the classroom, the desks are arranged in six rows. Each row has six seats except for rows five and six. Row five and six has five seats. In the back of the classroom, there is a science lab. In the lab, there are twelve tables for the students to work at. Situated on each side of the lab are computers and an eye washing station in case of emergencies. On the very back wall of the lab, is another Promethean board with a white board on one side of it and a periodic table on the other side. At the front of the room on the side opposite side of the door is a desk. There is a podium, where the laptop is situated as well as a lava lamp that is pink and orange. Behind that podium, she has a table filled with various supplies and books. Her file cabinets are directly behind her table. There is also a sink that sits on the wall behind her podium. The walls of the classroom are not decorated. Behind her podium there are clipboards hanging on the wall that has the names of all the students in each of her classes. There is also a paper hanging that has all of the phone extensions to everyone in the school, just in case the teacher needs to get in touch with anyone quickly. The phone is directly under the paper with the extensions. When you walk into the classroom, there are three computers and shelves that hold multiple books and some pictures. There are also some cabinets that hold supplies that are used in lab. Everyday there is a set schedule for the classes. First period arrives around 7:45 am and the tardy bell rings at 8:00 am. Upon entering the classroom, the students sit down and get to work on the science starter. The science starter normally consists of one or two questions that the students went over the previous week. This is a way for the teacher to see if the students are retaining information over time. After a certain number of science starters, there is a quiz of all of the questions that were asked. Then they receive some type of instruction, whether it is a lab or ISN, which means interactive student notebooks. Good behavior in this classroom is rewarded with Titan tickets. A titan ticket can be awarded any time that the teacher sees fit. Teachers and administrators can give these tickets to anyone. Students build up their titan tickets and receive rewards. The more Titan tickets, the better the reward. From what I have gathered, there is not much parent involvement in this classroom. There are a couple of parents that have weekly contact with the teacher to gather their students progress. At the beginning of the year, the teacher gives the

parents all of her contact information and communicates with them that she is available whenever they need her. Student Characteristics There are 28 students in the sixth period class. 17 (61%) of those students are Caucasian, 8 (29%) are African American, two (7%) are Hispanic, and there is one (4%) Asian. 68% of the class is males, while females only make up 32% of the class composition. 39% of the class is classified as gifted and talented. There are three students with a learning disability and each child is medicated. There have been improvements As reported by the 2012 pass test, thirteen of the students scored exemplary on both parts of the test. Six students met the standard on each part of the test. Three students scored not met on one or both of their tests. There were also two students that scored exemplary and met on their tests. In addition, three students just transferred to West View, so their scores are not available yet. One student scored exemplary on one of the test and scored a not met on the other. That is not a typical score on these tests, and this student is being tested for special education. Implications Some of these contextual characteristics have an effect on instructional planning. My Hispanic students are taken out of class for about ten minutes to receive some type of instruction. Even then, they do have some language barriers in the classroom. Sometimes the teacher has to pull them aside and talk to them about their questions. They do have some hardships, but normally it is easily resolved. The teacher provides dictionaries for them as resources. After giving the student survey, I learned a lot about the diversity of my students as well as the implications for which I needed to plan instruction. This survey also helped me to establish some expectations for myself and for the students. When asking the students about qualities that make a good teacher and student, I had expectations in mind. I plan to hold my students to these expectations. Some of the reoccurring answers were respect, responsible, a good attitude, and willing to learn. It is important to know the students expectations of me as well as know why they like science, so that I can plan instruction that they will enjoy. Most of my students like games and labs/experiments. Since I knew that my class liked labs, I asked what type of music they prefer to listen to. Most of them answered rap/hip hop and pop music. Labs can be designed with some type of music. I plan to have a lab about responses to stimuli. We can listen to different types of music and see how our heart rate responds. I think it is of great importance to make sure that I am teaching interactive lessons that students can engage and actively participate in. A bunch of my students like sports and being outside. This works great with a science classroom. Most of the lessons that I teach will be some type of lab and have to do with being outside. When we are outside, we will be looking at some different animal species, so it was important that I found out that my students liked different types of animals. The most common answer was dog, but other students included snakes and cats. I would use this to draw on their schema when introducing a new topic. The most basic discussion I could have with them is about abiotic and biotic

factors within the environment and then move into the more specific conversation about autotrophs. A good many of my students have been out of state and really want to travel out of the country. I think this is great that they have these aspirations. In my science classroom, I could take about the landforms in some of the regions that they have travelled to or want to travel to. Natural resources from each of the regions would also be a good conversation to have. This would all have to take place at school since not all of my students have Internet access outside of school. It was important for me to ask if they did, because that affects my homework assignments. Outside responsibilities also affect my homework, so I asked my students what responsibilities they had at home. Most had to clean, do laundry, do their homework or even protect themselves. I would use this information to establish a safe environment for my students. I do not want them to worry about having to protect themselves in my classroom. They will be safe. It is important to me to learn about my children as well as they need to learn about me. This survey would be given to them when we start off the school year. In response to them filling it out for me, I would fill out my own and share it with them. That way, I can make connections right from the start. It shows them that I care about them and want to really know about them. It also helps me differentiate and plan instruction. I can use the schema that they have built up to further their understanding in the content area.