The instructor for this class chose to take a practical approach to our learning on diversity. Using an ADST focus, we were asked to create a classroom. In groups, we had to come up with our classroom seating plan, our desk layout, the way we wanted to organize the space, our classroom agreement, our conflict resolution plan, and we had to create 24 students. Our group decided to create students each. The criteria included 3-6 IEPs total and 12 students who were diverse under six categories: religion, behavioral, learning ability, cultural, language and gender/identity. Because our group was 4 people, we each created 6 students, 3 of which were not diverse and 3 who were. We had to go into specific detail about their personality, their ethnicity, their learning abilities, their quirks, their strengths, and their stretches. What made this class activity so useful to us as future educators is that it framed our learning in relation to students who we had either had before or we will have in the future. Classrooms are getting more and more diverse, and as educators, we have to rise to new expectations to make them feel welcomed and valued in our classrooms.

The second part of this activity, which included how we wanted to design our classroom, let us go through the steps that we will have to take once we have our first real contract as teachers. While we will not have these opportunities in this program, going through the steps of “what kind of classroom space do I want to cultivate” was a very good mental exercise and useful to all of our futures. For example, we as a group discussed the benefits of having plants in our classrooms, which is something that I had not considered before, but now I am definitely going to put plants in my first classroom.