Ricky Thacker Appalachian Leadership Lab

I entered my 9th year of teaching at Betsy Layne High School I was presented with an opportunity to move classrooms. Through my previous 8 years of teaching my classroom environment was similar to a 1915 classroom that had no access to technology. I had 5 rows of 5-7 desk in each row. Students were working individually and there was little collaboration between students. My former classroom was teacher centered. My capstone idea is to re-design the learning space. With the addition of the district’s technology initiative every freshmen was given a laptop computer. I wanted to create a student centered classroom. My vision of my room was having a room that had white boards around the walls for students to use. Instead of desk, students would be standing behind countertops.The countertops would serve as the students work station. In the center of my room I would acquire chairs to create a theater or forum type atmosphere. To develop a positive climate, I decided to paint the walls with bright colors. With the help of my wife, we decided upon the colors of orange and yellow. This classroom re-design was needed due to increasing students retention rate. Attached is some pictures of the change from tea