"The Second Classroom"

I have recently been conducting action research about second language learners in different classroom environments and have made many interesting observations.  Last week I felt a little overloaded with work at the school and I couldn’t quite put my finger on what was happening at first.  I realized that as a supplementary teacher or support teacher that I connect with almost every teacher in the school at some point or another because many of them teach my students.  In addition to trying to find time to collaborate with other teachers, I have to function in two different types of classrooms.  Gerald Campano describes this in his book, “Immigrant Students and Literacy,” as “the second classroom” (2007). The first one is where we function as the instructors of the academic curriculum and it is the “second classroom during the margins and in between periods of the day that builds curricula around the students’ identities” (2007).  The first classroom is the state mandated classroom in which we are required to teach “basal instruction and test preparation” but the second classroom is more “organic” and is created by students’ “interests, desires, forms of cultural expression, and stories” (Campano, 2007).  This time is an “invisible and uncompensated” time period.  This period is also extremely critical as it is the time that teachers are able to build relationships with the students and nurture them.  It is extremely important that a student can bring their own rich cultural experiences to this space.  Campano explains that “the buried histories that our narratives materialize, the sense of community that we establish through memory, the relationships we nurture and sustain, and the children’s own life experiences would all become important intellectual and academic resources” (2007).  In an ideal classroom, students would have a hand in their own instruction and share their own narratives as a way to build upon their own life experiences.  The part that saddens me most is that I am limited by how I can influence the experiences that the students have outside of school.  It is a rather hopeless feeling at times when all you can do is lend an ear and schedules limit your availability for the student that needs nurturing.  But I know that this second classroom is really underlying and at the heart of all first classrooms.  It all may be a little overwhelming at times but students really do need teachers to offer that minute, their ear, and some space so that their emotional needs are met too.

Presented by:  Erin Cathey

Reference:

Campano, G. (2007). Immigrant students and literacy. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.