• The Responsive Classroom
    The foundation of Miss Almeida's classroom!
    An approach to teaching that emphasizes social, emotional, and academic growth in a safe environment.
     
    "Children need to think that you care before they care what you think!"


    learning

    Guiding Principles
    Seven principles that guide the Responsive Classroom approach:

    • The social curriculum is as important as the academic curriculum.
       
    • How children learn is as important as what they learn: Process and content go hand in hand.
       
    • The greatest cognitive growth occurs through social interaction.
       
    • To be successful academically and socially, children need a set of social skills: cooperation, assertion, responsibility, empathy, and self-control.
       
    • Knowing the children we teach-individually, culturally, and developmentally-is as important as knowing the content we teach.
       
    • Knowing the families of the children we teach and working with them as partners is essential to children's education.
       
    • How the adults at school work together is as important as their individual competence: Lasting change begins with the adult community.



    Classroom Practices
    At the heart of the Responsive Classroom approach are ten classroom practices:

    Morning Meeting - gathering as a whole class each morning to greet one another, share news, and warm up for the day ahead

    Rule Creation - helping students create classroom rules to ensure an environment that allows all class members to meet their learning goals

    Interactive Modeling - teaching children to notice and internalize expected behaviors through a unique modeling technique

    Positive Teacher Language - using words and tone as a tool to promote children's active learning, sense of community, and self-discipline

    Logical Consequences - responding to misbehavior in a way that allows children to fix and learn from their mistakes while preserving their dignity

    Guided Discovery - introducing classroom materials using a format that encourages independence, creativity, and responsibility

    Academic Choice - increasing student learning by allowing students teacher-structured choices in their work

    Classroom Organization - setting up the physical room in ways that encourage students' independence, cooperation, and productivity 

    Working with Families - creating avenues for hearing parents' insights and helping them understand the school's teaching approaches

    Collaborative Problem Solving - using conferencing, role playing, and other strategies to resolve problems with students





    http://www.responsiveclassroom.org/about/aboutrc.html