Classroom Spaces

I was looking at some book titles for my Education courses and one of them caught my eye because of this class. It's called Classroom Spaces That Work by Marlynn K. Clayton and it deals with the set-up of grade school classes. Whenever I've walked into a classroom, the first thing I notice is the way the desks are arranged. They are always deliberately arranged in a way that is conducive to either group activity, individual work, or isolation for the kids the teacher's consider disruptive. Then my eyes focus on the walls. I look for the student's art, projects, charts, the teacher's art and decoration. I usually judge what kind of a teacher he or she is based on how the walls and bulletin boards are organized. If it is neat, colourful and generally well put-together I think that this teacher must be organized, engaging, reliable, well-liked, and competent. If it is cluttered, inconsistent or clearly missing pieces, I assume the teacher doesn't put her full effort into teaching since it looks like she just tossed whatever she had around onto her walls. The funny thing is that in my experiences and observations, my assumption are usually correct. An ugly classroom is usually accompanied by a teacher who is just fed-up with her class and resorts to the easiest lesson when planning her next day. Places have meaning and represent the people who inhabit the space. In a classroom, the place should represent both teachers and students, but a classroom that is put-together without care and thought only represents the teacher and her attitudes and doesn't provide the medium for students to be represented.