Creating Inclusive Classroom Community

One of the key components of creating inclusive lessons and including all students in instruction is to create a community that makes all students feel valued and capable. Below are a few ideas and resources to use to create communities that support learning in your classroom:

Establishing Ground Rules: 

Ground rules make students accountable and engaged in their own behavior. This exercise also establishes roles, boundaries, and expectations. Additionally, having students be a part of the process for creating round rules for their class invests them in the meaning behind the rules. Facilitating a discussion, but making sure that you as the educator know what it is you are not willing to negotiate is important. This process also helps to foster community - balancing the educational needs of the individual with that of the group.

Here is one guideline for creating a classroom contract.

Engage flexible group collaboration:

Getting students to work together in flexible ways allows them to find each others strengths. Benefits of collaboration are beyond just having more brains that think differently to accomplish a task. Collaboration at its core allows students to get to know each other, and encouraging respect and understanding.

Here is an article on flexible grouping that highlights it's strengths.

Highlight students strengths and support their weaknesses:

It is important in the classroom to find ways to let students show of what they are best at. This helps them feel valued, and for others to see their strengths. Additionally, it is crucial that students feel the classroom is a safe space for them to work on their weaknesses. As teachers we can find ways to support these weaknesses and potentially make progress on them.

Here is a list of strategies that help all students show off their strengths.

Connect with Students:

Get to know your students and what gets them excited about learning. The more you know about their learning styles, the personalities and the way that process information the more you can tailor your lessons to make sure they meet each and every student's needs.

Why connecting with students is important

Connect with Families:

Find ways to make your student's family feel as though their voice is important in their child's learning. Keep them informed of what is happening in the classroom and potentially even find ways to bring them into the classroom. This is helpful for building trust between teachers and parents, and also for students to understand you are invested in them.


Provide Immediate Feedback with low-risk assessment:


Be self reflective: 

When you find that students are not experiencing success, first look at your own practice to determine if there is anything you can do better to help your students learn. Being self reflective can be difficult, but is an essential process for becoming a better, more inclusive teacher and reflecting that in both your lessons and your classroom.