Examining the classroom setup

Physical and environmental factors

Teachers and students rarely get the chance to choose their own classrooms and may be faced with challenging physical and environmental factors which are largely out of their control.

Some classes have limited space to accommodate large groups. Other classrooms may be an odd shape or have a layout that makes lesson delivery more difficult. In some classrooms, there may be little natural light while in others it may be very bright. Some have mainly artificial lighting rather than natural light, which can have a detrimental effect on students’ ability to concentrate. Some classrooms have poor acoustics and the sound echoes around the room. Others have thin walls.

Teachers, who are generally more physically active in the classroom, are often hotter than students, who spend most of their time sitting down. Depending on their cultural backgrounds, teachers and students may not see eye to eye on the benefits of having windows open. A lack of fresh air can also be a problem in some schools located in cities and it seems that air-conditioning or heating, which can be noisy, is rarely the right temperature for anyone!

Thankfully, teachers usually have more control over other aspects of classroom organization.

Classroom layout

In a traditional classroom, students’ desks are arranged in rows facing the ‘front’ of the room where the teacher stands. This classroom layout, which effectively minimises student to student interaction is perhaps most suitable for a ‘lecture’ style learning environment. Typically, any teacher-student interaction takes place with the students in the first couple of rows, while the students near the back of the classroom are far less engaged.

Some teachers say that they prefer this classroom layout because the students can concentrate better in a quiet classroom atmosphere. Other teachers have never really given much thought to the layout of their classroom – even though they spend a great deal of time organising their timetables and preparing their lessons.

In some classrooms the desks are fixed to the floor or sufficiently cumbersome that teachers are understandably reluctant to ask all the students to move their desks around the room. It is likely that they are envisaging noisy, disruptive chaos. However, even in classrooms where the furniture is easy to manage, some teachers are surprisingly reluctant to experiment.

Classroom environment

Classrooms can often appear cold and uninviting with white or grey walls and sterile appearance. Therefore, many primary school teachers put a lot of effort into brightening up their workspaces and making them colourful and attractive.

As well as making the classroom more visually appealing, many teachers often take the opportunity to try and create an ‘English speaking zone’. Putting up coloured posters showing the numbers 1-10, the alphabet, colors, animals and clocks can support the vocabulary that the students are learning in class and help to make it more memorable. In addition to posters, teachers often put up signs in English saying things like, ‘Welcome to Class 4B’ or label different parts of the classroom ‘our library’. Posters with classroom language such as ‘Could you say that again, please?’ or ‘How do you spell that?’ are also typically found on the walls of children’s ESL classrooms, together with displays of the students’ work.