Diana Zrate Nevada State College EDU 206/ Fall2011 Dr.

Berman Class Meetings Class meetings are very important in a classroom. Class meetings give students an opportunity to voice their opinions, manage their emotions, see different perspectives, learn ethics/ justice/ and morality. Also class meetings are effective ways to develop communication skills; students learn to express themselves orally, written, and with facial and bodily expressions. In my classroom I aspire to hold many class meetings throughout the school year. Topics of interest for classroom meetings can be; students with disabilities and how to treat them, rules and procedures, upcoming projects/plays/skits/fieldtrips, current events, school policies, school events, etc. Students learn a great deal from class meetings. Its structure and form provide infinite amount of skills to students such as leadership, social justice, democracy, The Socratic Method, democracy, communication, higher cognitive reasoning and so much more. Three skills are defined and explained a little more in detail in the graphic organizer below. I incorporated a lot of structure from the military, specifically the U.S. Marines. I was in the service and learned a lot of discipline and organization skills from their programs. More on this can be read on the graphic organizer below: structure/organization.

Diana Zrate
When: Preferably the first week of class. The purpose is to introduce students to a democratic environment and discuss any concerns or arguments. Follow up meetings every month are encouraged also F

EDU 206/fall 2011

Student Skill #2: The Socratic Method Students will learn a form of inquiry and debate between individuals with opposing viewpoints based on asking and answering questions to stimulate critical thinking and to illuminate ideas.

Student Skill #3: Democracy Students will learn that in our classroom all the people have an equal say in the decisions that affect our lives.

Student Skill #1: Social Justice Students will understand that society is an institution based on principles of equality and solidarity. Student will learn to value human rights and recognize the dignity of every human being.

Sample Class Meeting 4th-12th grades

Structure/Organization: Class will be divided into two sides; left side (port), right side (starboard). There will be jobs available:
Instructions:

Guide: Student, who represents the class, is in charge of leading the discussion/meeting. Scribe: student in charge of writing and recording and keeping track of records of the classroom meeting. Squad leader: portside and Starboard side will each have two squad leaders that represent those students. 4 in total

-Tell students that class meetings will be held every time there is an issue in class that needs to be resolved -Divide class into Port and Starboard side -Offer Jobs for class meetings, let students know that holding a job is a privilege and can be revoked at any time