Equipment in an Effective Classroom

Classrooms are often equipped with the necessary tools and equipment to facilitate the learning of the students. The tools available in a classroom are often designed according to the level of learning of the students and depending on the nature of lessons taught in the class. Ordinarily, a classroom should fulfill the knowledge demands of students through availing the tools necessary for lab reports, discussions, emergencies, and/or examinations (Sieberer-Nagler, 2016). In modern day learning environment, technology has facilitated learning in several ways making computers a mandatory tool for teaching students and note taking. This paper focuses on the tools observed in effective classrooms and how such tools facilitate learning.  A good classroom has both teachers and learners. The teachers dispense knowledge to the students using particular teaching aids while the learners are the knowledge recipients (Cook et al., 2017). Comfort is important in the classroom because teachers and learners spend most of their time in the classrooms. To enhance comfort, both the teachers and learners must have desks and seats. The desks allow appropriate sitting postures, and cannot lead to health issues such as back pains. The floors should be neat with a dustbin at the corner, in which students and educators can deposit waste paper. The walls of the classroom should be painted regularly with bright colors to enhance the lighting of the classroom.   The lighting should be conducive, especially natural lighting. The design should allow for maximum ventilation and an emergency door opening to the outside of the classroom. These emergency doors are very effective during evacuation operations in times of fires or gas emissions (Cook et al., 2017). The class should also have a fire extinguisher to assist in putting off fires during emergency operations. Further, a first-aid kit for students and teachers during accidents. Aptly put, the class should be equipped with sufficient safety tools that can enable the knowledgeable people and/or doctors to assist students during emergencies. There should also be a blackboard/chalkboard and a duster for clearing the board in the process of learning.  In modern classrooms, 3D hologram technology has become a rampant teaching aid. Therefore, classrooms should have internet connection and a landline to enable communication and access to information. Projectors also enlarge pictures during learning making them clearly visible to students and are regarded as effective teaching aids (Sieberer-Nagler, 2016). Effective classrooms have desktops for use by the lecturers. The computer labs are equipped with most computers, which can be used by all the students. Akin to note is the fact that both teachers and students must be of the right number. A typically balanced classroom should contain a teacher student ratio of 1:15. An overcrowded classroom is not a conducive environment for learning because the teachers and students do not have ample time to interact, given the huge number of learners.  On the wall of the class, there should be a clock for showcasing the time. A calendar for the date and planning purposes should also be pinned to the wall of the classroom. Planning is an important aspect of learning. Therefore, it is also important to reflect the goals of the class on the wall for the students and teachers to keep focused on such goals. The classroom should also have a suggestion box to allow students to openly state their issues and enable appropriate action to be taken. The focus of the class is to facilitate learning through providing avenues for reporting issues and dealing with emergencies (Sieberer-Nagler, 2016). Neatness is key in classrooms because students are allergic to different things, including dust. The sitting design of the class should allow the teachers desk to appear in front of the class so that all the students can see him/her.

References

Cook, C. R., Grady, E. A., Long, A. C., Renshaw, T., Codding, R. S., Fiat, A., & Larson, M. (2017). Evaluating the impact of increasing general education teachers’ ratio of positive-to-negative interactions on students’ classroom behavior. Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions, 19(2), 67-77. Sieberer-Nagler, K. (2016). Effective classroom-management & positive teaching. English Language Teaching, 9(1), 163-172.