Physical Classroom Environment

I am currently working on my practicum in a 9th grade differential geometry course. The curriculum used currently is the Common Core, but will be switching to CPM within the next year.
This is a sample classroom that I am working with this semester, since there are multiple classrooms that Ms. Resourceful is in. As you can see, the students are put into pods that contain individual desks, where they are all able to collaborate with one another and do group work together. There are two teacher desks in this room. One teacher desk is located at the back of the room in the right corner and the other is located in the front right corner of the room in order to have the lecture part of the class period/block. In the front of the classroom, there is a whiteboard that is extended almost to either end of the wall, posters on the sides of the whiteboard, an overhead screen in front of the whiteboard, a filing system to turn in homework or have handouts available, and an outlet for technological use. The teacher desk at the front of the room has a doc cam that could be used to write on a piece of paper along with students instead of standing at the whiteboard in the way of the field of vision for some students, an overhead projector on the ceiling in order to show the document camera work and other work from the Apple TV that teachers are able to work with, there is a microphone for amplification of the teacher's voice in the classroom, and a computer and tablet that teachers have the opportunity to pull up files and textbooks with.

This may seem like an ordinary classroom, and it may not seem that way. Each teacher sets up their classrooms differently, so I had to ask a teacher why it's set up the way it is. Ms. Resourceful decided that most of the work in class was going to be group work, so she set up the individual desks into pods of 4. She also has a space for her grading in the front of the classroom, so she is able to grade papers from previous classes and watch students while they take a quiz/exam. The pods are positioned close to the teacher desk so that the students are able to hear her voice when explaining homework or a new concept to the class. She is required to put up posters with the cell phone crossed out in several different places to remind students that phones should be put away during class time. There are also the posters that Ms. Resourceful puts up for motivational purposes required by the school in every classroom, and a list of what the students know, what they will learn today, and what they understand which is erasable and is changed each day. Also, a very important poster she is required to have is one of the daily schedule which comes in handy when someone forgets what time the period starts and ends. Most of Ms. Resourceful's items up on the wall are required, but she has some motivational posters that are not required neither by the school nor by the district. The technology, in Ms. Resourceful's opinion, impacts the students with what they turn in and how much they hear. She has a microphone that hooks on like a necklace and is connected to several speakers on the ceiling. It helps students especially when her back is turned toward the board and she is proceeding on with an explanation to either a concept or a problem. Ms. Resourceful has adapted technology in the classroom from the Apple TV to the document camera and microphone, which all seem to be having a huge impact on her students. She doesn't wish for any other technology in the classroom, as there is a lot of tech being used already.

With the explanation of the classroom that Ms. Resourceful had given me, I was able to find out how I wanted my physical classroom to look and what to put in certain parts of the room and why. The physical layout of my own classroom would be in pods since I would strive to have more group work in the classroom and less of a huge lecture-based curriculum. I would have a teacher desk in front of the students with a document camera set up there, so I am able to have a central focal point in the center front of the room, and so students are easier to see when there's a hand raised. In the classroom, I would have motivational posters that would probably be required of the school/district, but I would also include a homework poster that is dry-erase friendly to list homework for the week, a formula list that students would be able to add new formulas to that we learn in class, and some inspirational quotes that could help students think a little harder about math. The technology used would have to be a microphone for students to hear my voice clearly no matter where they sit, a computer to document grades and use textbook pages for lessons, an iPad for writing in answers to the slides in which the PowerPoint was made, a document camera to write down answers with students if the iPad is down or not part of the plan, and an overhead projector screen in front of the whiteboard with an overhead projector in the middle of the ceiling, so that I could be able to point different things out in the book and make sure that students are following along with what I say in class.