HOW TO CREATE GOOD LEARNING ENVIRONMENT:

Good Relationships

Get started early. Build positive relationships with students

and parents starting with the first day of school. Let students
get to know you (and each other) by preparing fun
icebreakers or exchanging letters. Consider sending a letter
home to parents or calling each home to establish those
relationships right away.

Take your time.  You may be tempted to jump right into

content when the school year starts, but taking the time to
build relationships will pay off later. You'll create individual
relationships that last and a community for your students. 

Ask for help.  Your fellow faculty and staff are your greatest
resource. Reach out to the teachers next door or the
thousands of teachers on Twitter. There will be someone out
there who not only has an answer to your question, but
wants to connect and join your professional circle.

Clear Communication

Speak their language.  Use humor, tech, or other strategies

to get on their level. That extra effort will go a long way in
relating to students. This strategy can be used to present
traditionally "mundane" information, like classroom rules and
regulations.
Start from scratch.  You might know your rules backwards
and forwards, but remember your students are most likely
new to your teaching style and expectations. Try not to
assume your students know how to do seemingly basic
tasks, like collaborating or taking notes. This can be time
consuming, but like building relationships, it'll pay off.

Trust

Let your students make decisions.  From classroom layout to

project ideas, let students have a say. Fewer decisions for
you to make and fun for students to feel like they helped
create their environment.

Put your trust in technology.  New tech can be daunting,

but find one or two ways to make your class digital. Some
educators suggest making a digital newsletter for parents,
posting photos and updates on Instagram or Twitter, creating
a class blog, or using edtech resources like Google Forms or
Remind. This is a great way to engage students when class
isn't in session.

Trust yourself! Think of the beginning of each school year

as filled with amazing potential, and know you don't have to
get everything perfect on the first day or in the first weeks. 

What is Positive?
Positive is a desirable or constructive quality or attribute.
Constraints to creating kind of environment I would ideally like.

1. Everydayness of violence

Students I interviewed, wherever they were located, were clear that violence was all-pervasive
in society and in their own lives.

Violence is everywhere, all the time. Everywhere—it’s like, a part of life in a way. It’s like a part
of life. No matter what walk of life you’re from, if you’re from an affluent family, or from a
family that doesn’t have a lot, or—it doesn’t matter. Wherever you are on the spectrum,
violence will somehow work its way into your life. And in a school, it’s just like—violence is
almost a cool thing. When you’re a grade nine, you get initiated. They never caught me, though,
I ran all the way to grade ten. They never caught me. But getting beat up when you’re a grade
nine in high school is like the norm. It’s not even looked upon like—well, if the principal catches
wind of it, he’s a disciplinarian or whatever... But at that age you’re vulnerable because you
don’t know who you are. You don’t have an identity. You’re still searching for what kind of group
you belong to—what kind of circle you fit in—and your self-esteem level is unstable.

2. Control, connection and meaning trauma has caused by events that “overwhelm the ordinary
systems of care that give people a sense of control, connection and meaning.” (Herman,
1992:33) Many writers have suggested that for trauma victims, therapy should be directed at
helping the survivor regain a sense of control, connection and meaning in her life. Through my
earlier research (1999/2000) I began to see some of the complexity around control, connection
and meaning in relation to education. During this current study I came to see even greater
importance in these three areas for youth, especially in the school system. These three themes
weave throughout this paper. Students continually reported their difficulties with the lack of
control they experienced in school, and described confrontations as they sought to obtain
control through skipping school, arriving late, misbehaving, or failing to produce homework. The
school and welfare systems try to take control through removing students from violent homes,
or removing them from school when they commit violence, fail to attend, or fail to pay attention
in the required manner. These attempts increase the confrontations and do not, I believe,
support learning. Students and professionals spoke frequently of the difficulty of creating
connections across the institutional divide, and the increasing challenge as cutbacks and school
and welfare policies limit connection between students and professionals in the school. In
painful contrast to these “protective” limits, students state in a myriad of ways that connection
with adults who they can come to trust is perhaps the most important aspect of supporting their
learning. Students, teachers and other professionals all spoke of their struggles to find meaning
within their own work and particularly to conceptualize “success.” Because students who
experience violence at home or at school lose confidence and a sense of their own worth and
ability to act in the world, programming which supports the rebuilding of an empowered self-
concept is crucial to support learning. Shaping new meanings for students and professionals
may be a key step in finding creative ways to enable students to learn successfully. 4 Control –
Control is a complicated terrain. While some learners don’t like being controlled, they may also
be mistrustful of being in control. When students stop and start programs, they may be trying
out some form of control. Connection – Connection is necessary for communication. We can’t
assume learners can connect. Building connections may take a lot of work and takes time.
 Meaning – Trauma can result in a loss of “meaning.” This may make it hard to imagine goals and
to find meaning in life or in words.

CREATING SAFER ENVIRONMENT FOR LEARNING

1. Removing Students From The Violent Home

The Ontario Child and Family Services Act states that “If a person has reasonable grounds to suspect that
a child is or may be in need of protection, the person must promptly report the suspicion and the
information upon which it is based to a children’s aid society.” This seems straightforward: children
need to be protected from violent adults. Any adult who suspects a child is experiencing violence must
report this. But students repeatedly told me that they were not asked what was wrong and that asking
was essential. One student was particularly eager that I make sure that teachers understand the
importance of such careful questioning, as she was adamant that this was the most important thing that
could have been done to support her learning: 2 Trying to remove violence does not create a safe
environment I think that people in the schools, if you see a kid in that kind of situation...like the way I
was, missing school and that stuff—if the child doesn’t answer you, then you should at least ask them
“Do you need food? Do you need any bus tickets?” Start off like that. That could make them tell you
something, I’m telling you…When I was going through my grade school, I just had them buy me stuff...
clothes and stuff, but no one specifically asked me “Natalie, what’s wrong at your house?” Which they
should have… Of course I would have said something, because I would have believed that they wanted
to help me. That’s what teachers need to do, I’m telling you. You have to sit down, and—even if they
don’t say nothing. You could ask them specifically, straight up, “okay do you have a problem at home?”
If they say no, you ask them why are they missing school. If they still say nothing, then ask them what
they need… I think counsellors should ask these kids, because I’m telling you, it’s important. Believe me,
they’ll learn more, they’ll do something, if somebody else will pay attention. If somebody else pays
attention to them, they’ll learn better.

2. “Protecting” students from bad teachers (or is it: protecting teachers from bad students...)
Policies that appear to be designed to protect students—removing them from violence in the
home, and avoiding the possibility that “bad” teachers can exploit vulnerable students—can
become means whereby talk about the violence in students’ lives is silenced and isolation is
increased. As one student said: A lot of students would need to feel a little bit closer to a
teacher, but didn’t they just pass something that said “students can’t email teachers, students
can’t do anything with teachers out of school” so I don’t know how anybody’s ever going to get
close. You’re not going to tell a stranger. You know, if you see them once a day or whatever,
you’re not going to tell a stranger about all your problems that you’ve been through. Now that
they’re making it even harder, I don’t know what you would do…The whole point is, you’re not
allowed to cross that line anymore… And I know a lot of people—even last year, I was moving
out on my own, and one of my teachers, they were selling their cottage. They brought a whole
bunch of things from their cottage, and they told another teacher, and they got me some things.
And I was so happy, and she gave me her email address, she said “Just let me know how you’re
doing,” ‘cause she retired. And then it was really weird, I actually found it and I was about to
email her just to let her know I was okay, and how I was doing, and then I heard that thing on
the radio, and then I was like “That’s really ridiculous.” Because that teacher helped me, she
 never—it was never anything but helping a student. And she sat there and talked to me about
what was going on, and she was a lot of help. And to say that—I would never have told any
other teacher, but she knew something, and she’d been my teacher for a while. I think it’s
ridiculous to say that they’re going to be that strict…A lot of teachers, if you can get closer with
them they’re just human beings like everybody else.

FURTHER ANALYSIS OF TEACHERS’

Further analysis of teachers’ professional development Further to the discussion of teachers’
professional development in this chapter, Chapters 4-6 show how teachers’ professional development
inter-relates with the other key policy themes of TALIS. Chapter 4 shows how teachers’ teaching beliefs,
their teaching practices and their professional co-operation are related to their participation in different
forms of professional development. Chapter 5 examines how teachers’ professional development
activities are connected to school and teacher evaluation practices and allows an assessment of the
extent to which these practices are related to providing the development that teachers need. Chapter 6
examines how different school leadership styles are associated with teachers’ professional development
activities and sheds light on the degree to which school leaders can shape schools as professional
learning communities. Finally, Chapter 7 examines the significance of professional development among
the determinants of classroom disciplinary climate and teachers’ self-efficacy. In addition, these findings
prompt further policy questions and thus the need for further analysis of the TALIS data. The thematic
report on teachers’ professional development, which is being produced jointly with the European
Commission, will seek to do this. In particular, it will seek to examine more thoroughly the factors that
determine participation in professional development as well as the factors that determine the differing
impacts that teachers report for alternative types of development activities.

References:
L., Berryman, T. and Brunelle,R.(2002). International Proposalsfor Environnemental
Education:Analysing a Ruling Discourse.Proceedings of the International Con-ference
on Environmental Education:“Environmental Education in the Con-text of Education for
the 21st Cen-tury: Prospects and Possibilities”,Larissa, Greece. 6-8 October 2000,