I enjoyed the Parent-Teacher Conference I attended yesterday because the teacher was nice and because the school atmosphere was too.
In this particular school, where a lot of my students go to and where I’ve been to a number of PTCs, is really a delight to visit though when one looks at the physical aspect, it does not really look like a school.
Not that the school is physically nice, in a way it is, having been a big mansion in its previous life (the big sweeping staircase, the big rooms, Moen kitchen faucets?, big windows, super big yards) it now houses a lot of happy students. One doesn’t feel the school atmosphere, it feels like a home where they go to learn. The children do not just learn academic skills, they learn people skills and self-help skills too. The teachers are great and the teaching methods are too.
If it isn’t that far, my children will go to this school too and learn to mingle with special needs students.
Save for the formal name of their school, the layout of the classrooms and the presence of the college students, my children’s school is like this too: happy school atmosphere, great teachers (many of them have been there more half their lives!), non-traditional teaching methods and special needs classmates. The former homeschoolers seem to look at me differently when I suggest we do homeschooling again 😀 Not with dancing, swimming and Scouting clubs in school, no way. They even got excited to see high schoolers taking care of baby chicks, three of which belong to their big sister.
School atmosphere is very important. One should feel happy and not stressed upon arrival in school. Students should look forward to learning new things and seeing their teachers and friends. Students should feel at “home” and feel comfortable. They should feel the warmth from the school staff.
School morale should be high too.
Does your school atmosphere have these things?
This entry was posted on Friday, July 2nd, 2010 at 7:04 am and is filed under Being a (Special Ed) Teacher, Bits and Pieces, Interesting tidbits, Philippines, special education, Teaching Techniques. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.