TPE 2: Creating and Maintaining Effective Environments for Student Learning

 Evidence of Achievement: Example

I welcome each student in the morning as they enter the classroom. The day begins as I say, “good morning, welcome, and I am happy that you are here.” Greeting every student with these affirmations is a choice I make to promote a positive learning environment. By openly stating that all students belong in the classroom, we develop into a community. Each student arrives in the classroom with different cultural, academic, and socio-economic backgrounds. By knowing that they are welcome and belong in our community, they begin to learn that they have a safe space where they know that they are welcomed and appreciated.

Elements

  1. Promote students' social-emotional growth, development, and individual responsibility using positive interventions and supports, restorative justice, and conflict resolution practices to foster a caring community where each student is treated fairly and respectfully by adults and peers.

  2. Create learning environments (i.e., traditional, blended, and online) that promote productive student learning, encourage positive interactions among students, reflect diversity and multiple perspectives, and are culturally responsive.

  3. Establish, maintain, and monitor inclusive learning environments that are physically, mentally, intellectually, and emotionally healthy and safe to enable all students to learn, and recognize and appropriately address instances of intolerance and harassment among students, such as bullying, racism, and sexism.

  4. Know how to access resources to support students, including those who have experienced trauma, homelessness, foster care, incarceration, and/or are medically fragile.

  5. Maintain high expectations for learning with appropriate support for the full range of students in the classroom.

  6. Establish and maintain clear expectations for positive classroom behavior and for student-to-student and student-to-teacher interactions by communicating classroom routines, procedures, and norms to students and families.