Contextual Factors Essay:

Two environmental contextual factors for each of the following areas:

Community

The environmental contextual factors that affects teaching and learning in the school I’m working with is that the community is the Catholic Church. Firstly the Catholic Church determines which books and other materials are taught and the students are required to attend Mass every Thursday and Friday during the regular class time for school. Secondly the Catholic Church supports the school completely by having facilities for the school to function in and overseeing all the rules and mandates of the school. Another environmental contextual factor that affects teaching and learning is the City of East Ridge Tennessee where the school is located. Although the city doesn’t financially support the school the East Ridge police department is a great support for the school. They have recently visited the school to help them in forming a plan for intruder procedures. They visited each classroom and came to the teacher’s meeting that was held the next day. They assured the school that they would come to the school each week and make sure the students and teachers got to know them and also help the administration form solid plans for if the school were to have an armed intruder.

District

The district of the school I’m working with is the Knoxville Diocese, this diocese covers all the Catholic schools in the Knoxville and Chattanooga areas. The environmental factors that affect teaching and learning in the school pertaining to the Knoxville Diocese are firstly that the diocese determines where the schools is located and what the school looks like or how it is decorated. These environmental factors impact teaching and learning by creating a bright and positive environment, (school building/classroom), for the students to learn in, and for the teachers to teach in. Secondly the school district provides a budget for the school which allows for the materials the teachers need to teach the students and along with the technology the teachers use to teach their classes with. All the classrooms have computers, ELMO units, and smart-boards for the teachers to use to teach their students.

School

The environmental contextual factors that affects teaching and learning in the school I’m working with is that the school has small class sizes and total community support from the Catholic Church. Because the class sizes are small, about 16 students per class this give the teachers more flexibility in how they can teach and also give the teachers more time to help individual students as needed. The school is a very stable school because it has such great support from the Catholic Church with the church providing the building where they meet for classes, finical support, and providing the structure of the educational system they use. The church also requires the students to wear uniforms to class. This is very unifying to the school and provides a noticeable comraderie among the students.

Classroom contextual factors:

• Physical features

The instructional setting included four walls and two doors. One wall was lined with bookshelves labeled library, a white board, a promethium board with the teacher’s desk in the corner with a computer area. From that corner to the door there was another white board and a magnet board with message boards on each end, this wall also has a small desk for me to sit. The wall that begins at the door was lined with student lockers with supplies cabinets above them. The remaining wall has the other door and large windows with green flowery curtains. There is a large puffy chair on the wall with the windows and a podium in the corner. The desks are arranged in wide rows so that I can walk through them (I have to use a walker to walk). The classroom is open enough to allow ease for both learning and teaching.

• Availability of technology equipment and resources

There is a computer in the room for the teacher and it is connected to an ELMO unit so the teacher can display and model information for her lessons, the ELMO unit project onto a white board. This technology is used daily and it makes teaching lessons much more impactful because the teacher can model any new skills or information and retain the notes she makes at the same time. What I mean by this is that the teacher doesn’t have to erase the white board, whatever she modeled for the class is written on paper (or whatever media) and the teacher has it for reference or for the next class.

• Extent of parental involvement

The parental involvement in the class I’m in is that the students have an agenda that they write their assignment in and the parents can look and see what the assignments are. There are also parent teacher conferences that the parents or teachers can request if the student is in need of help. I attended a parent teacher conference last week where the father wanted to help his son at home of improving his grades. The father of the student was very involved in his son’s education and needed information from the teacher on what she was teaching in the classroom and how he could encourage/help his son at home.

• Other classroom contextual factor

Grade level and classroom subjects are other classroom contextual factors. I’m participating in a sixth grade classroom where the students change classes. There are two groups of students that rotate in and out of the classroom all day. The subjects my host teacher teaches are language arts and science. The grade level of the students allows for some flexible lesson planning because the students can contribute the lessons or can need re-teaching on concepts that they have already been introduced to. The subjects of language arts and science have a wide variety of areas that can be covered and therefore allow for a wide variety of lesson planning.

Four student contextual factors that impact the design of instruction and assessment of learning:

The student contextual factor of age impacts the design of instruction and assessment of learning in that instruction and assessment has to be designed to be age appropriate. When creating lesson plans the teacher has to make sure the lesson plans are in the students age range, even if the students are below their grade skill level the work still needs to be age appropriate for the student. For example if the student is eleven to twelve years old the teacher would assign a book that is appropriate to the student’s age for a reading assignment and not a book that is meant for a kindergartener. Keeping all the material in the lesson plan age appropriate is very key to engaging the students in the material and therefore helping them to learn the material, gain from the instruction and be assessed properly.

The student contextual factor of culture impacts the design of instruction and assessment of learning in that the Catholic Church chooses and or approves all curriculum that is used in the school. This student contextual factor impacts all areas of instruction and assessment because the teacher can only use what the church provides or allows and can only assess the students in the way the church allows.

The student contextual factor of skill levels impacts the design of instruction and assessment of learning because lesson have to be planned around the skill levels of the students that will be taught. I have spent time in observations and talking with my host teacher to help determine the skill levels that I should gear my lesson plans toward. The skill levels of the students are very important to know before a teacher creates a lesson plan for the class. The skill levels of the students impact instruction and assessment greatly because if the instruction in the lesson is too difficult or too easy the students will not be engaged with the material. In the same light if the assessment is too easy it will not be a good measure of instruction or learning and if it is too difficult or too far above the students skill levels then it will not be a good measure of instruction.

The student contextual factor of gender impacts the design of instruction and assessment of learning because the lessons have to include both genders. The classroom I’m working with has a mix of both girls and boys so it would be inappropriate to choose material that were overly feminine or overly masculine. The student contextual factor of gender also impacts instruction and assessment of learning because girls and boys generally have different learning styles, girls are more prone to be good listeners, take good notes, and like reading, while boys are more into math and logic. One boy in the sixth grade I’m working with has asked several times as the teacher is teaching, language arts, “When am I ever going to use this?” none of the girls have even intimated that they are bored or think the information won’t be useful. 

Discussion of student skills and prior learning that may influence your development of each of the following three components: learning goals, instruction, and assessment.

In my observations I have been paying special attention to what the host teacher is teaching as far as content, to gain an idea of prior knowledge and student skills, and how the students respond to the material. I have also talked with my host teacher and asked questions on student skills and prior learning to determine how to plan my lesson plans. I will continue to be aware of the student skill levels and prior learning experiences as I work on future lessons. The student skills and prior learning of the students in the classroom I working with will influence my development of  learning goals, instruction, and assessment because they will be the first thing I think about during lesson planning and development.

•           Learning Goals

My observations and talking with the host teacher has helped me develop learning goals that will be specific to the class and not over reach what the students will be able to accomplish.

•           Instruction

This information from my observations and talking with the host teacher also helps me when I am planning my instruction by helping me to know how to fully engage the students without overwhelming them with material they are not able to either comprehend or accomplish.

•           Assessment

Student skills and prior learning are incredibly important when developing the assessments I will use in my lesson plans. I am often asking the host teacher about her assessments and if what I’m planning is in the appropriate range of difficulty for the students. I consider her my best resource of the student’s skills and prior learning so I use her advice when I’m planning assessments for the class. Student skills and prior learning influences assessment because the students must have the skills and prior knowledge needed to be able to complete the assessment the teacher is challenging them with. The teacher must have a working knowledge of what the students skill levels are and what the students prior knowledge is before creating an assessment for the students. A good way to assess student skills and prior knowledge is to give a pre-assessment before you give a final assessment, this will help the teacher to be able to re-teach any material that is needed for the students to have success in the assessment.