Classroom Contextual Factors, and Students as a bonus!

I decided to toss my Students section in here just in case you all were interested. Enjoy!

Classroom:

My classroom is fairly large with 34 desks in an interesting formation, that looks like two E's facing each other on each side of the room, with some island desks in between. The students are surrounded with books, and there are 8 computers at the back of the room, though they seem to be reserved for the use of another class that sends students in to use them. There are multiple posters around the room that relate to the writing process, as well as a poster with step-by-step directions for starting class, and a poster with instructions for ending class. The document camera is up front with the Smart Board, and the projector is right up close to the Smart Board, so no one can really walk in front of it because it's up too high and cleverly angled. The feeling of the classroom is one that is hard to describe, since it combines a sense of sterility with a sense of being in a book nook, and it may account for the discomfort that some of the students seem to feel on entering the room, though I am continually intrigued by the books I walk by around the room. The 6th grade students get to use the books, so they love the space, but my 8th grade students I'll be teaching have no relationship to them, and so don't find any value in having them around the room. I've been using the document camera and the SmartBoard quite a bit when assisting with vocabulary, and I really enjoy having these tools available, unlike in my student teaching. I'll definitely be using a lot of mixed media and technology since I have the necessary tools available.

Students:

I'm teaching one of my cooperating teacher's 8th grade language arts classes. My class has 16 boys and 14 girls, though it sometimes seems to be all boys because they're so much louder. Part of my task is definitely to make the girls participate more. My class is mostly made up of white and Hispanic students, in a very even mix, with a couple of students of other ethnicities. I have six TAG students and two IEP students, though one of them is both TAG and on an IE, and requires a lot of encouragement and extra motivation because he doesn't see the point of a lot of the work we assign. I have one ELL student in my class who has been classified as a level 2, but my teacher believes he's really more of a level three, or he wouldn't be doing as well as he is in this mainstream, grade-level class. I also have two AVID students who are very well supported by the staff, including the aide we now have in my classroom who comes in specifically for them and our ELL student. I will definitely be doing a lot of differentiated instruction, as well as incorporating some of the SIOP (Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol) elements I've learned in my ESOL class. I've decided to incorporate a lot of literacy activities and SIOP procedures because they benefit everyone, not just the students on IEPs or who are in AVID or who are English Language Learners. I also chose the book I'm doing my unit on, Tangerine, because it addresses racial and economic issues in a community and in a middle school, and I believe my students will have many insights and connections to make with the text since they are in a similar school.