Teaching Styles

It can oftentimes be difficult to share your “class” with another teacher but it is important to remember when in a coteaching situation it is not your class or the other teacher’s, it is both your class now.  Before school begins, it is a good idea to sit down and discuss how each of you will interact with each other, the students, and the content being taught.  There are a few main teaching styles used for co-teaching::

Team Teaching - This is the model we use.  Both teachers share the responsibilities of delivering instruction to the entire class.

One Teacher, One Drifter - One teacher leads instruction while the other teacher drifts around the room clarifying and working with students who seem to be falling behind.  

Parallel Teaching - Both teachers deliver instruction but at the same time.  So one teacher would work with one group in a part of the room while the other teacher delivers the same lesson to a different group in another part of the room.

Classroom Procedures

 

Being on the same page as far as classroom procedures go will make the transition from two classrooms to one progress more smoothly. It's like raising children, mom and dad should agree on the rules so that their children will not play one against the other. Everyone has his/her own discipline style, however to set some ground rules in the beginning may prevent some confusion later.
Some topics to discuss:

• classroom rules and policies including homework procedures and policies 
• detentions 
• how and when to contact parents
•  Lesson plans
•  Grading and grade book 
• Bathroom passes 
• Hand raising

Two Classrooms into One- The First Steps

Often times when presented with a co teaching situation, two teachers are combining resources and classroom materials into one space. This has happened to both of us. It's a good idea to have open communication about how to do this without stepping on anyone's toes. The best advice is to always be open and honest with your co worker.  Everyone has pet peeves but as long as everyone is open about them, the more problems can be avoided.

Some things to consider when merging classrooms are as follows: 

• materials do you combine them or keep things separate? Referring to teacher resources many of us spend our own money on materials. It seems the longer you teach the more we accumulate...often some are past down from our friends who are lucky enough to retire. Make sure your name is written somewhere on the resource.
• classroom supplies-paper, pencils, markers and all kinds of other crafty supplies 
• teacher desks- should you have one to share or both have a desk? This may also depend on how much room there is in your classroom. Recently we decided to forgo one teacher desk to save room. After all we don't sit at them much anyway.  If you decide to each keep a desk is it ok for the other person to go in your desk to get something? 
• set up the classroom where is everything going to ? How will student desks be arranged? Rows? U shaped? 
• file cabinets 
• student access to supplies- markers, glue etc.
• bulletin boards - do you each have your own? Is one person going to be in charge of all the bulletin boards in the room? 
• If you do not teach all your classes together is it a problem if the person who is on prep is doing work in the room while the other is teaching?