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Make sure to start your post with your FIRST and LAST name.

Only do ONE post with answers to each question listed below.

#1 - Describe an example of a positive culture that you have either experienced as a student or witnessed as a member of a school. What were the aspects of the culture that made positive impacts on students and staff?

#2 - Conversely, describe an example of a toxic/negative culture that you have either experienced as a student or witnessed as a member of a school. What were the aspects of the culture that made negative impacts on students and staff?

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a positive experience I have had was in fifth grade I had just transferred elementary schools. all throughout my schooling I had always struggled with feeling like I was 10 steps behind everyone and thet my teachers were moving on without me. this was especially true for math. however, my teacher in 5th grade really spent intentional time undertsnaind me, the things I was going through at the time, and how he can go back and reexplain everything I had missed in a way that I understood.

2. a negative experience was in freshman year of high school my English teacher had favored a specific group of people so much so that her favorites were not expected to behave, or contribute as much work to the class as everyone else. I think this teacher only expanded the divide between the popular kids and everybody else.

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1.    The current school that I work in is one of the most positive cultures I have witnessed in a school setting. We are a small school, 6 teachers and an assistant in each classroom. We have a positive principal who understands what it’s like to be in the classroom and not everything is going to go as planned. Everyone encourages one another, respects one another, and always has each other’s backs. We all have one goal in mind and that is to meet our students where they are and create a positive and safe environment for students to come to every day.

2.    A negative experience is one that I experienced in high school my freshman year. The teacher rarely taught if at all. We would read our textbooks the entire class. I can remember her classroom had nothing on the walls and I rarely remember seeing her get up from her desk. She was never mean or rude, but just didn’t do anything to get us interested in chemistry. I later struggled in my chemistry class, but thankfully had a wonderful chemistry teacher who was more than willing to help us that were struggling before and after school to help us catch up and understand what we were learning.

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1- A positive culture that I have experienced in school was in elementary there was a music teacher and before we even started a lesson or if we ever got into the lesson she would ask how everyone is doing and talk to them just about life and although we were kids looking back it meant a lot because it always put me in a positive mood.

2- A negative culture that I have noticed is how teacher will call students out in front of their entire class on only the smallest things. This is mainly in middle school and high school and as teachers we should embaress students like that instead pull them aside and talk to them in a calm voice and explain what they have done and explain how to change what they did

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A positive culture I noticed in high school was when my math teacher would ask students how they're doing before. It wouldn't just be based around math, but she checked on how everyone was doing mentally or academically in their other classes. I feel like she really wanted her students to succeed.
A negative culture I noticed was favoritism with teachers. This mainly happened in high school when people could have the same teacher for more than one class or two years in a row. Some teachers were good about making sure this didn't impact their relationship with other students, but it has become a problem before. This is negative because some students feel excluded and don't get the best possible education.

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1. One of the more positive experiences I had was in high school. I had an English teacher who went above and beyond. She took the time to get to know each and every student, their likes and dislikes, their grade averages, their families, etc. She made sure her students felt at home around her. She changed the way I viewed school, and got me to where I am today. I am still in contact with her and we have became good friends.
2. One negative classroom experience was also in High school. There was one teacher who only cared for the 'popular' kids. the underdogs were often forgot about and their work would fall behind. the "popular" kids got snacks, bonus points, and just special treatment all together. This really made everyone else in the class upset and they dreaded going to her class everyday.

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1. One of the few positive experiences regarding culture I've had as a student was attending schools in a district with educators that looked like me. My dad is a teacher and a coach so I naturally hung around other teachers and coaches, typically they were also Black. I had a Black principal in middle and high school. I am currently under mentorship of a Black principal that was formerly a teacher at the elementary school I attended and she watched me grow up along with her own children. Finding a familiar face within a deluge of people was comforting and necessary. Knowing that I could go to any one of these educators and ask for advice or simply vent because they knew exactly where I was coming from was unmatched. I did not find much comfort at school as an adolescent, but having the luxury of knowing I could go to those I found familiar to me is something I will always hold near to me.

2. While I mostly had positive experiences with my father's coworkers, a few of them would hold my status as his child over my head. I would get held to much higher standards than most of classmates quite simply because "he's just an email away!" It instilled a lot of fear and unnecessary anxiety in me at a young age and I would melt down at the smallest things. I needed a lot of support academically in elementary and middle school but before any of those needs were addressed, I'd get threats of emailing or calling my dad if I didn't get my grades up within a certain timeframe or if an assignment wasn't to a teacher's standard. Academic support was often the last thing I would receive from both teachers and my own parents. While I understand why some teachers would do this, it was incredibly damaging and it caused academic anxiety that I still struggle with to this day.

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Stephanie Lampton

1. A positive culture that I have experienced was during my fourth grade of elementary school. I had a wonderful teacher that loved reading out loud to her students and even introduced the class to poetry and had us learn to recite some of her favorite poems. It was sometimes difficult to get a room full of ten year old kids to sit long enough to listen to her favorite books much less to get them to memorize poetry, but she always did it with a smile on her face and somehow managed to keep us quiet and mesmerized with the warmth of her sweet gentle voice. To this day I have a great love for reading and can still recite A Bird Came Down the Walk by Emily Dickinson.  I know Mrs. Lee was instrumental in this because she was a kind, wonderful teacher. She made you want to learn new things not just to please her, but to prove to yourself that you could do anything you set your mind to.

2. A negative culture I have experienced was in high school art class. There was a male teacher that was not only toxic with words but was a little touchy with his students. I loved art, but knew I could not stay in that environment and transferred out of the class after a couple of days. It was a small school and that was the only class offered. Looking back I wish I would have had the courage to report him, but at the time I was only 15 and I was too scared to talk to anyone about it. I also feel that many, many, people including faculty knew what was going on and did nothing to correct his behavior.

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1. A positive culture I experienced is when I had my senior year english class. I got really close to the english teacher and she is the one that inspired me to actually pursue education and become the president of my high school's rising educator's club. This experience made me grow and I became a stronger person as a result.

2. A negative experience I had was in my band class. My teacher always favored the male students over me. He took away my solo that I had worked for and ripped me off of my senior solo. It really hurt me and it messed with my trust of other peopke.

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1. A positive culture that I have experienced was one of my students got the chance to be on our schools Light House Team. Our school is a Leader In Me school. If you are not familiar with what that is, it is a leadership program that teaches great leadership skills in our students. They learn how to lead various activities and reach out into our community. My students are in a self-contained unit. I reached out to my principal and ran the idea of one of my students being able to be on the team and without any hesitation he was on board to make it happen. It was not only great for him to be on the team but for those students to get to work with him and help teach him about being a leader was very heart warming.

2. A toxic culture I have seen is bullying. There will never be a 100% fix of bullying. But what I feel should happen is ALL students need to be held to the same expectations no matter if they are the star of the sports team, a staff members child, a wealthy family in the community or just a simple plain family such as I was. A parent that I am friends with told me of a situation her child was going through and it broke my heart. Her, much like myself of being a simple plain family, was being made fun of for being larger than the other 6th grade girls. The girls that were making fun are well known in the community and are much smaller and not fully grown as my friends daughter. After nothing was addressed on school property, my friend's daughter made a tiktok blasting the bullies on her own time. Those girls were hurt and offended by the video, took it to the administration and she was reprimanded for that whereas the bullies never got in trouble. Since this incident, there have been changes to keep this from happening again, but it was sad to see my friend's daughter have to experience what she did.

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Victoria Gottfried
1.)  The most positive culture I had was in high school, I had a teacher who made us feel so welcome. She was interested in what we were doing in our lives as well in academics. She made it known that we all needed to speak respectfully to each other and that everyone that spoke their opinions could be heard without being ridiculed. These seem like simple things, but not every teacher would do these things.
2.) A toxic classroom culture was my 10th grade English class. We had a sweet old man as a teacher who was about to retire, but I guess he didn't care so much anymore. We had "circles" which was a new thing the school was trying out to get us to connect. But they went wayward in his classroom. Many people were disrespectful of others opinions and it usually turned into one person just talking about their opinion the whole class period, which usually didn't end well. The people with the most extreme views usually got the most time. It was a poorly executed plan to have students connect. It mostly discourages people to have a differing opinion.

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1.) One positive example I have experience in the classroom was during my freshman year of high school when I was at Chino Hills High School in Chino Hills, California. It was a conditioning class and my coach/PE teacher was a former NBA player who taught us work ethic, which was something I struggled with greatly at the time. I was lazy and would just go through the motions of life with no real intent just using my God given physical gifts to get me by playing sports. He was incredibly hard on me but in a good way. He would push us but not to the point to break us and it greatly helped us not only mentally but physically as well. He would invite us before school to run either up and down the hills of Chino Hills or have us do sprints on the beach (this was all optional, only those who cared would show up). This created an internal awareness that helped not only me, but a ton of my old teammates that led us to play college and pro ball. This created a strong bond between student/teacher and coach/player similar to Master Shifu and Po from Kung Fu Panda.

2.) One negative example I precisely remember was at International Christian School, which is a private K-12 school in South Korea when I lived there the 1st half of my life. I would always get in trouble for talking and would get punished in pretty unusual ways. I would get sent out in the hallways as a 6-7 year old for talking with the fellas and would have to hold both my arms in the arm air as a punishment for like 5 minutes. That doesn't seem like much, but as a little kid it felt like an hour and it would strain your arms quite a bit. Another punishment I remember was having to stick my palms up for the teacher to smack them a few times with a yard stick. I mean I guess I could've just stopped talking in class but I probably didn't think of that idea as a kid. I didn't really care for that teacher too much after and I definitely did not want any form of contact with her afterwards. I haven't really had a bad experience in the USA though yet. With all that being said, being born and raised overseas really helped me grasp how good we have it here in the United States (not California they are absolutely delusional there and ruined the state).

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1) One of the most positive experiences that I have witnessed in my school would Renaissance.  Renaissance is a program that rewards good behavior and grades. At the end of the year, there would be a Renaissance Rally that was the most fun event of the year. The Rally encouraged all students to make the grades to attend.
2) One toxic experience that I have witnessed was when there was rumors that a teacher was having inappropriate relationships with one of her students. The school had no proof of this just what students have said. They asked this teacher to leave the school without proof and they turned the students against her. It was really unprofessional the way they handled it and I this teacher was a family friend of mine. I do not believe the allegations were true at all.

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1) An example of positive culture I have experienced has actually been as an Instructional Assistant. For over a year I have worked with MSD children both in an MSD classroom and in general education. I do my best to take the children I assist to their general education classes for multiple reasons. I have fallen in love with how open the teachers and the students are with the children I assist. Teachers will acknowledge the child while we are going for a walk during a sensory break and students will wave or say hi. Everyone works to include all of the children we teach in every aspect and that is what set me on the path to become an Elementary Education major.

2) Most of my personal experiences seemed negative. I have had multiple teachers that would regurgitate information and move on to another subject and criticize students when they attempted to ask questions. I have been with teachers that will say they have done great things but are stuck teaching. In both of these situations most students stop participating in the class and as such, would have problems in what they learned from those teachers. Fostering a positive environment is critical for any student at any age.

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1) The most positive culture I have encountered was in my high school's visual arts magnet. The teachers brought all 4 grades together for various events and classes held multiple grade levels. Lots of us had good connections with both our teachers and the students. We were also the smallest magnet at the school and had deep pride and respect for our peer's work.

2) A negative culture I witnessed was in other classes of the school I was in. It was a magnet school and was extraordinarily competitive which led to more negative feelings between peers than positive. In art it was still satisfying to see another student succeed. The competitive spirt led to students who couldn't keep up or were struggling to fall behind and sometimes be left behind. I knew one kid in VA who had a 1.2 GPA and was in his junior year. They kept passing him. It felt like they just didn't want to deal with him and couldn't wait to pass him on to the next person. I don't think he ever ended up meeting the graduation requirements.

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1. The most positive experienced that I encountered was when I was a middle schooler. We were moving states from Ohio to Tennessee. Therefore, I was a new student, not knowing a single soul in the entire building but everyone welcomed me with a warm smile and some even made conversation with me which made the transition much smoother. The aspects that really helped was the kindness that everyone had. Especially, the teachers. The teachers made it very aware for me that they were there to help me get acclimated to this new setting which eased my nerves of being "the new kid." As a future teacher, I will make every student feel welcomed like I felt.
2. Something that I have noticed is when teachers get frustrated quickly. When a student sees a teacher become angry, they might be fearful to engage in class discussions or even ask for help. So, it is important to maintain a positive spirit. Students should feel comfortable enough to interact with the teacher without being scared to say something.

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a postiive impact my school was when i was able to help create new improvments through my school with the adivosry board i was a part of and being a part of a team of leaders put together to create a better learning enviroment.
a negative Impact was how lost some of the students were mostly new ones not being noticed and how there needed to be improvments

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1. The most positive culture I have experienced in school was created by my freshman chemistry teacher. While her class was hard she was always very encouraging and gave us all of the resources we need plus some. She was always extremely positive and helped us understand things for other classes as well. Due to this we all highly respected her and were eager to go to her class everyday. She kept in touch with me throughout high school and pushed me to  follow my dreams of being a teacher.
2. In contrast, a negative culture I experienced was in the 7th grade. My teacher was the opposite of encouraging and quite frankly scary. She kept a belt in her desk and threatened to hit us with it if we acted out or talked during school drills. She brought it out on several occasions to assure us she was ready to use it if need be. One day a student was talking in the hallway and she decided public embarrassment was the best punishment. She lined the entire 7th grade into the hallway and made us watch as she screamed at the student in the middle of the hallway for 10 minutes. After this, the student was never the same and almost dropped out of school later on. This teacher struck fear into everyone and made going to school nearly impossible. We were all too busy trying to be perfect in her class that none of the knowledge shared was actually learned.

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1. An example of a positive culture I have experienced in school was when I helped with the Project Unify program in my high school. Working with these students, playing games with them, and helping them whenever they needed had both a positive influence on the students who helped as well as the students who received help.
2. A negative culture I have experienced in a school was in an engineering class I took in high school. We didn't have an actual teacher, just a long-term sub, so none of the students really gained anything from the class and it made it hard to learn when everything was online. The sub didn't know hardly anything about the content, so we had to try to figure it out on our own.

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#1: Growing up, I have always attended public school in my small county. It has always been such a positive and welcoming environment. All of the staff in every school I have attended have always been outstanding and showed that they loved and cared about their students. These staff members would go out of their way to teach and make learning fun for all kids. My mom is the counselor at one of our local county elementary schools and she is a prime example of one of the outstanding staff in our county. She goes above and beyond for the schools and students and never ceases to amaze me.
#2: One negative experience I have had as a member of one of my schools is the lack of discipline in one of my former lower-grade schools. Before switching to my mom's elementary school, I attended a local school closer to my residence. The principal at the time handled situations of conflict in questionable ways. This certain principal made the atmosphere of the school more negative and not as comfortable. The students were impacted and would often receive unnecessary consequences. After removing this staff member, the school's culture became much more positive and comfortable.

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1.) The best experience I can take away from looking back on my education was a AP Human Geography class. The teacher was friendly but also didn't put up with students acting out. We started each class with a bellringer and then discussed answers as a class. Another thing I enjoyed about this class was how we watched different videos that were actually very informative and relevant to the topic at hand compared to some teachers that just throw on a video that doesn't really help strengthen the topic at hand. Looking back at this class I can confidently say that I learned stuff that I can actually apply in my future.
2.) A negative experience from school I remember was a social studies class in 6th grade. The teacher was mean and never really did a good job of engaging the class. Another thing he did I didn't like was he kept us past the bell for lunch everyday for at least five minutes. This didn't really motivate me to put in a good effort in the class.

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1. A positive culture I have witnessed was my baseball coach in high school. He was also me PE teacher and every time you would see him he always brought the same energy. He always brought a positive work environment to school and a positive attitude that fed off to other people making in a fun year. He was one of those dudes you could talk to about anything and it fed off from the people around him
2. A negative enviornment I have been in would be one of my middle school teachers. He would sit up in the back of the class and just go throw a slide show with a bunch of notes on each and not really explaining anything. He was also just grumpy everyday he came in and you could tell he just didn't really wanna be there and that he didn't care about his job. No one would want to go to his class, because he would basically just scold you for anything that you did and would always make rude comments and stuff like that

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1- Luckily, growing up,  I came from a very wonderful school district that encouraged positive and safe culture structure. I can think of so many positives, so it is hard to narrow it down. One vivid memory was my first grade classroom. I truly can vividly remember my year as a first grader. The teacher catered to every style of learner, truly made all our learning into game. No child was ever negatively singled out, positive reinforcement always, and school felt like a big party everyday. Yet, I swear to this day, first grade was a year I learned the absolute most in and to this day I still use some learning tricks I learned way back when.

2- on the opposite spectrum, negative. I went to a private school for two years in elementary school. One year I had the worlds most negative teacher. One story that I vividly remember is when the teacher audibly made fun of a child's stutter in front of the entire class. I can remember word for word how she repeated and the child was mortified. Aside from that, everyday was a dark cloud. The teacher hardly reinforced us, we were stationary all day, and she did not cater to every child.

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1.)A positive culture I have experienced in school was in high school. My freshman year U.S History, was and still is the best teacher I have ever had. She made the classroom room a fun learning environment by incorporating games, group dissuasions, and never made anyone feel dumb. She taught very well and was always excited for every class even at the end of the day. This teacher was always there for me, even after freshman year, I would go hang out in her class room and just talk to her like a friend.
2.) A negative culture I have experienced in school also happens to be freshman year. I had a horrible Spanish teacher. She Ould always pick on me the most and I would be the only one she would ever call out. She almost made a priority for me to have a horrible year in her class. She would pin point me for every little thing and even made me sit alone byself in the hallway for class.

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One example of positive culture I have experienced was my high school Spanish teacher. She was able to relate to us on a personal level and have friendly conversations with us, but she also had the ability to get us to do our work and have fun doing it.
A negative culture experience I have had was a professor my freshman year who did not care about anything outside of class that could be affecting us or our attendance, they only were concerned about the grade we would be getting in that class.

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1) One example of positive culture that I experienced would have to be having a strong mentor/teacher as a coach all four years on the track team. As a coach he valued having great relationships and taking the time to get to know you as a individual. He created a safe climate culture allowing one to feel like they could openly talk about personal issues. When it came to the classroom he kept a great balance of being playful and silly but also continuing to push students and know when it was time to become stern.

2) A bad/negative culture I experienced was my environmental science class I took in high school. This particular teacher never tried to create strong relationships with students and never made it a priority to connect with her students. The class become very unorganized and dysfunctional. Students never tried to be attentive and listen. She would not try to teach in ways that adapted to different learning styles instead she shared videos and movies. Overall these factors resulted into an ineffective culture and negative atmosphere.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced in school was in elementary school. Every teacher I had made everyone feel safe. They always let us know that we had someone to talk too and let us know we always had someone there for us. They helped us ins chill when we were struggling. They made sure we knew mistakes were wanted and that it was good to make them. They never made us feel bad for not understanding something or doing something wrong.

2. A negative culture I have experienced was during my first semester of college in math class. My professor wasn’t very nice to begin with. If you didn’t know how to do something, he made sure you felt stupid for not knowing. Instead of helping, he would degrade you in front of the whole class. This made other students and I not want to go to class or do the work. It made us feel as if we were the problem, when it was him.

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1) One positive thing I had from a teacher was my cousin who was a math teacher. She was very helpful with all students and students who she had in the past to help with their math homework. She would go through each problem and make it clear as possible for the students to understand it.

2) A negative experience I had was from a history teacher. She was very lazy in how she taught her history lesson going straight from the book or whatever was on the slideshow, someone else had made. She would make us do discussions about certain events that happened in history. But during these discussions some of the students didn't get to voice their opinions on the matter and rather hear from the popular students and the smart ones.

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1) One positive culture I experienced was in one of my math classes in high school. The teacher had a great relationship with each of us and made sure to have that relationship, but also switch it into teacher mode when needed. We all knew we could trust him with any problem we had whether it was a personal problem, a school problem, or a math problem. Everyone loved him as a teacher because he also had a way of teaching that made the curriculum seem fun and entertaining no matter how tedious or boring the topics were.  He had a great vibe to his classroom no matter the day he was having. He definitely loved each one of us and made in known by how he talked to us and reacted to our misbehavior. He had tons of patience but not TOO much and knew when to redirect us and he did it the right way. I would love for every student to have a teacher as awesome as him.

2) A negative culture I experienced was my geology class in high school. Our teacher didn't really try to get to know us very well and seemed to hate his job in all honesty. He didn't seem like he enjoyed being there and that caused us to not want to be there either. There were times when he made us feel uncomfortable by making weird/inappropriate jokes and stuff and that just threw the vibe off for the entire semester. Not only did it seem like he didn't want to be there, but he didn't really know how to teach. He just didn't really know how to keep us engaged or get us back on track or anything and it was very evident. He often would yell and slam a book on the table when we were getting off track and that just didn't seem like an effective way to redirect us.

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1) An example of positive culture in my high school was that the teachers were always willing to lend a helping hand. The way the teacher acts has one of the most enormous impacts on the school culture. Specifically, in my pre-algebra class I did not understand a problem and the teacher's aide was more than willing to walk me through each problem step by step.

2)An example of the negative culture at my high school was that there were fights between students in the halls. This made school a scary environment for me. The student's behaviours impacted the school's culture and my experience.

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1.  One of the most positive cultures I experienced was in my AP World History class.  The teacher was not only extremely familiar with the content and was helpful in that area, but he was also very outgoing and tried to forge a connection with everyone in the class.  If he had any type of bias in the class, he did not make it known to his students.  He also did a very good job of making the class feel familiar and comfortable with one another.  He took the time to have us get to know each other and made sure we were all in contact with one another.  By the end of the class that year, everyone was friends with one another and we went on to keep in contact afterwards.  Almost everyone that had this teacher had a really good time in his class while also learning a lot. We also often talked to our teacher whenever we could in order to reconnect with him.
2. One of the more negative cultures I had was in my Dual Credit Trigonometry class in 11th grade. The fault of this class was not with the teacher I had (I had him the next year and he was one of the best teachers I had), but rather just how the class was structured and scheduled. The dual credit students were put in the same class as a Dual Credit College Algebra class and an AP Calculus class. The teacher of this class had to focus mostly on the AP students as he was the one actually teaching, leaving the other students to use online resources. The teacher, however, would try to help us as much as possible but would often go back towards the AP students. This type of structure led me to have a lower grade in the class than it could have been.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced was my 7th grade teacher. She taught language arts, math, and was my homeroom teacher for 6/7 grade. She was a young teacher and I had never had a teacher under the age of 40 so it was something new to me. She almost played a big sister role in my life; I would turn to her with advice and she would help me, but also taught very well. She always brought a positive, bubbly vibe to the classroom that made everyone genuinely want to learn. She knew exactly how to deal with uncomfortable situations and hear both sides of any story. She always made sure everyone understood what was going on. She made all her powerpoints, worksheets, papers, have cute fonts and colors. Her classroom was decorate with pretty decorations and it had a warm vibe to it. She ended up being my confirmation sponsor too because of how much she impacted my life.
2. A negative culture I have experienced was a math class during my sophomore year of college. The teacher was just rude. She would make sassy remarks to anything people would say. If someone was confused she would almost make of them for asking questions. She embarrassed people in front of the class. She also barely taught anything, we had to teach ourselves pretty much everything. Our homework was to fill out worksheets of information we had to figure out, even though she gave us little to no information about how to do it. Everyone dreaded being called on because if our answers were wrong we were afraid she was going to make a comment about it. It got to the point where we would all laugh at how much she tried to pick on us, so it ended up not being embarrassing after a while.

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1.) A positive culture that I experienced in my life was my high school soccer team. You could have had a really bad day at school or at home but once you reached the field then everything else was left at the gate and the only thing you worried about was playing well and having fun with your teammates. Everyday we had practice during the fall but I enjoyed it due to the fact that the entire team was on the same page. For some people, practice was our outlet to get away from the stressors of life. From senior to freshman, everybody got along and everybody was respectful to each other. We all not only made each other better players but also better people.

2.) A bad/negative culture experience was my AP biology class. My professor not only was blatantly bias towards people but they did not try to teach us the material. They just put up a slideshow on the board and asked us to follow along. My teacher would call out people who were not doing well in the class to make an example out of them to scare the rest of the class. Public embarrassment is one of my biggest fears so when they would do that it not only made me not want to be in the class but it also made me feel like that I had to get perfect grades to be acceptable. That class was a toxic environment for not only me but my other classmates after I had talked to them. The obvious bias also made the lives of the other students harder due to favoritism. All these aspects of culture produced a very toxic environment for me as a teenager.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced in the classroom would be during my senior year in my AP Chemistry class. The teacher was very eager to teach us and loved what she taught so it radiated out into her everyday lessons and activities. She was always very positive and outgoing and made students feel welcomed. She also implemented these into her everyday classroom activities which mad class an enjoyable and fun environment. Students always respected her and she respected her students. It made for a warm and cultivating environment.
2. A negative environment that I have experienced would be a classroom where the teacher did not enjoy their job and brought a negative energy to the classroom. They did not want to be there and made that very clear to students. This in turn made students have the same energy and the same feelings towards the class. The teacher was not engaging and simply did book work or fillers for the entire class. Students did not enjoy this and did not learn this way so it was hard for students to enjoy it.

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1.) One positive culture I experienced was my senior year of high school in an AP Lit class. My teacher had high expectations for us but was super supportive and did a good mix of individual and group work and made sure routine and classroom culture were clear and well established. Her criticism was never cruel or mean spirited and she even offered a lot of her free time to help students on projects and had creative ways for us to learn the material.
2.) One history teacher I had in high school was a negative culture. He was one year away from retirement and just didn't care nor really taught us. He showed several inappropriate videos without any approval from other adults, and he constantly made people stressed and upset by leaving the national debt counter on the screen and saying we were "all screwed" and he'd "be dead soon so it wasn't his problem". There also were issues of bullying in that class he blatantly ignored.

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1. I have experienced positive culture in MANY ways. One in particular was in my first semester of college. My biology professor came off as very intimidating and grouchy. The more he opened up to our class, the more I rethought that "idea" I had of him. I was enrolled at a community college that had more non traditional students than traditional. Therefore, it was a difficult class for me. I understood the content, I was moving at a fast pace, but the class as a whole was not. He was drawn towards me because I understood the content. Not only did I comprehend it, I loved to help my classmates study and learn as well. He was always so supportive of me helping and encouraging my classmates. Little did he know, he was such a positive light in my life. I was struggling with the transition into college and the "real world" and he gave me the confidence I needed to keep pushing through. He always told me I would make a fabulous educator! I will never forget the lasting impression he had on me!

2. A negative culture I experienced was during my sixth grade english class. This teacher emphasized on treating others with kindness and inclusion. However, she only treated the students apart of the LGBTQ+ community with kindness. In my particular class period, we NEVER had any issues with judgement. But, this teacher would intentionally treat students that were not LGBTQ+ poorly. She called us names, singled us out, etc.

I was too young to think anything of this until a few years later. A video was posted of the same teacher spitting on a child for using a students incorrect pronouns. Then it clicked with me. Rather than treating everyone kind, she only treated certain students with respect based on gender, political ideas, pronouns, etc.

This hurt as a sixth grader. Having a teacher belittle you and have no idea why was crushing. Over the next few years, me and my classmates talked about this. Even those LGBTQ+ members felt singled out because of her actions.

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A positive culture that I experienced as a student was when I was in college a couple years ago in Birmingham, AL. I was fresh out of High School so I was nervous to start a new college four hours away from my hometown. I attended a biblical college. One of the classes I had was over Ethics. The teacher was interactive with the students. Even though he called on people, which I did not like, he made it fun and easy. Ultimately he was just trying to get everyone to know each other. He had high energy but also got serious when it was time to get serious. It made a huge impact on how much I wanted to study the material and how many classes I wanted to attend. I did not want to miss his class.
A negative culture I experienced was as a high school freshman. This was almost 10 years ago, but I remember it well because of the impact it had on me. I am a huge visual and auditorial learner. The class I was taking was a math class. Math is normally one of my best and most favored class subjects. But this particular teacher made it dreadful for me. The teacher did problems and examples straight from the textbook. We had to have our textbook everyday and we did problems straight from the book. She never taught the material or explain it, she just gave us the answers to the problems and how she got the answers. I have learned that math builds off of math. So she wasn't getting down to the why behind why she worked a problem how she did. She also was not very friendly in her appearance. She hardly smiled. I knew from taking that class that I wanted to be the opposite of that if I ever became a teacher.

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1. A positive culture that I experienced in school was in my Spanish class. I had heard for the three years prior to my senior year Spanish class that you didn't want a certain teacher, that she was hard and mean. However, I came to find out when I took her class that what people had said was simply not true. I walked into her class extremely worried but was greeted with a smiling face saying hello how has your first day been. Everyday following after she got to know me she would tell me good morning as I passed her class heading to my others. This lady was a cheerful light everyday throughout my senior year.

2. A negative culture I experienced was my senior year in English class. In my English class she was always very harsh and strict to my class and I just figured this was just who she was. However, my best friend was in her second class and they got extra time and treats and all kinds of help. That class contained the teachers daughter and now I understand why our class was treated differently.

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1. A Positive Culture that I have experienced as a student is that my CP Geometry and Algebra ll CP teacher never gives up on me or her class. If I don't understand an assignment she is always willing to help or do more to help me understand. She's always willing to listen if I need to talk and she's always very understanding. She always makes sure that her students understand and always cares about their well being. She makes it enjoyable to wanna come to her class and she makes it where I wanna learn.
2. A negative culture I have experienced as a student was my reading teacher in 8th grade. This year we were half virtual and have in person because of covid. He never wanted to help us when we were in person in his classroom. He never wanted to help with assignments or something that I didn't understand. It was hard to learn or even wanna learn in that class because of the lack of help. I didn't learn a whole lot that year from his class because all the work was online and so he just expected us to know how to do it all.

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1) A positive culture I have experienced in the classroom, was in high school with my English teachers from 10th and 11th grade. These two teachers have made such a positive impact on my life. I still talk to both of the teachers quite often. It is because of them that I decided to become a teacher. I want to do what they did for me for other kids. They were always there for me for whatever I needed, whether it was for school or for something personal. I was going through a whole lot of life stuff in these two years and both of these teachers did everything they could to make sure I would be okay. they helped me with school work, and would let me use their offices to sit in if I needed a break from everything. They are a part of the reason that I am who I am today.

2) A negative culture I have experienced in the classroom was in fifth grade. I ended up switching schools because of this negative experience. It was a science class and the teacher was extremely bias to the more popular kids. She would be extremely reluctant to help the kids that actually needed help. If one of the smarter kids asked her a question she would do anything she could to answer the question, but if someone like me, the not so smart, she would give a smart-alecky response. She did nothing to not show her bias, and when parents went to the principle, nothing was done because of how long that teacher had been there. It created an extremely negative impact to the classroom and caused quite a few kids to leave that school.

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1. One example of positive culture that I experienced in high school was in my PE class senior year. Going through out high school, I had always experienced PE classes that were used as a free period for students to do whatever they wanted to do. But during my senior year I was in a PE class with a teacher that had expectations for her students. She listed out her expectations of the class on the first day and she never wavered, even with a class of 30 students. She ran a smooth class and it was genuinely fun for everyone. Overall, she has shifted the physical education department into a success, and because of that she has earned respect from students and staff.

2. On the contrary, a negative culture that I had experienced in high school was in a history class. Freshman year, I had a sweet teacher who loved his subject and teaching, he just didn't know how to control a classroom. All semester students would talk over him and would not give him respect. The classroom was always loud, and you could barely hear him when he would give lessons. It was really sad to see students treat him the way they did. And it eventually turned into a class that I dreaded to go to everyday.

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1- A positive experience from a classroom I had was in 7th grade. I never really liked listening to books/participating in reading. The teacher always had a positive attitude and that changed my whole perspective from bad to automatically good. She read with such intensity it felt like I was there. So i went from disliking the class to being able to go in there proudly, confidently, and happily from the positive attitude the teacher gave towards teaching and the class. Everyone loved the class and even teacher's would stop in to listen to her read Night by Elie Weasel. She was loved by everyone in the building.
2 - A negative impact I had with a teacher was her showing biasness towards the people who agreed with her. She talked about politics a lot and liked to debate kids who didn't agree with her. This would cause a negative 'vibe' in the class because a lot of people were fed up with her attitude. She wouldn't get on the little group who agreed with her as much as everyone else just because we looked at things a different way. Not many people didn't like the class causing distractions, low grades, and carelessness.

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1. A positive culture that I experienced in my life was my senior year of high school. My English teacher took so much time to have a safe environment to learn in his classroom, and I always felt that I could come to him with any problem that I may have been facing.  Not only did he take the time to foster each student's learning, but he made it a point to get to know each student in his classroom in order for them to feel more comfortable. I remember going to his room several times on a bad day and him giving me advice on my situations. I feel its so important to cultivate that kind of relationships with students because they may not be getting that support anywhere else in their life.

2. A negative culture that I experience was my freshman year of high school in my AP Human Geography class. I felt my teacher didn't care about the content of the class, and I could not effectively learn from him. I hated going to the class and had to spend a large part of my time at home learning content for that class on my own. It was my first AP class and I did not feel like I had the needed support from my instructor.

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1) A positive culture experience I had was when I had a professor who would always asks the students where we were at before class started. He encouraged us to be honest and depending on where the class was we would spend the beginning of class with a stretch or we would just take a few deep breaths. One day we even walked the hallway before class started. These little mindful moments seemed silly at first, however they really impacted how the first moments of class went. It also gave my classmates a chance to get to know one another and fellowship.

2) A negative culture experience I had was my middle school social studies teacher that purposefully embarrassed students who needed extra help. I noticed my teacher instead of helping students who were not understanding the content or seemed disinterested by calling on them specifically to answer questions. This hurt other students who did pay attention because it gave them no way to participate in class.

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1) A positive culture that I have experienced was my 10th grade civics teacher. She always made sure that we felt the open space that she has created within her classroom. We always had open discussions on the topics of mental health, and better ways we can figure out a way through whatever situations that we were going through at the time. As a high school student, those conversations weren't occurring nearly as much as they needed to. Overall it was a positive and free experience that I'm glad I was able to have.

2) A negative culture that I also experienced was in my 9th grade algebra class. My teacher wasn't as open as most when it came to asking for assistance. He was almost stand offish and rarely engaged with us outside of what we were learning in class.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced was my freshman year of high school. My Social Studies teacher made me feel welcomed and let me and my classmates know that our voices matter. Being a freshman is nerve racking anyway so having a teacher that's so nice and happy is something I will always be grateful for.

2. A negative culture I have experienced was in my 8th grade year. My science teacher was one who made me dread going to science class, which was a subject I enjoyed. She was always so grumpy and acted like it was against the law to laugh or have some type of fun in the classroom. She was always very serious and straight faced. There was no warm welcome when walking into her class.

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1. A positive culture in my life was my freshman year of high school. My algebra teacher was very particular about everything and wanted everything done in a certain order, but it helped me in so many ways. It influenced me and challenged me to become better at math. I ended up really enjoying the class and ended up with a 96 that semester. I never enjoyed a math class until my freshmen year of high school because he made the learning environment so much and he was so much fun to be around. It came around to my senior year and I became his helper for his class. I ended up giving him one of my honorary diplomas. He helped my education in so many ways.

2. A negative culture in my life was my freshman year at college. I thought I was going to major in business, but I ended up not enjoying my classes and it didn't have any influence on me. One day I went to class, and I asked a question because I didn't understand because she was foreign so it made it harder for me to understand than normal, and she started laughing at me because she said she already went over that topic, and I should already know that question. It made it really hard for me to enjoy college at that time, but I ended up changing my major to education and I absolutely love the professors and learning environment.

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1.) A positive culture that I have experienced was in my middle school springs program. My teacher was super kind and always went out of his way to make sure everyone was confident in their ability to play their respective instruments. He also always had after school parties for things such as Halloween and Christmas. I learned a lot during those two years and my confidence in my playing ability grew immensely. Everyone loved this teacher and we always tried our hardest during concerts.

2.) Conversely, the negative culture I have experienced was on WKU's equestrian team. I won't directly name any names, but there was major favoritism towards a select few students and if you did not dedicate 100% of your time to the team, you were kind of outcast and left out. I'm a full-time student with a job and have my own personal horses to take care of so I could not dedicate 100% of my outside of class time to the team. I was just in the background and left out of most team events (as were others who were in the same situation as me). I eventually decided to quit the team after being asked to choose between my horses or the equestrian team. This made huge negative impacts on the students who were not the 'favorites'. I know multiple students quit the team because of the immense favoritism and the toxic environment it created. Many students were also held back from their true potential on the team, me included, just because we could not offer all of our free time to the team. The students who were considered favorites got offered lots of opportunities and one-on-one lessons by the coaches.

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Directions - Make sure to start your post with your FIRST and LAST name.   Only do ONE post with answers to each question listed below. 

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Directions - Make sure to start your post with your FIRST and LAST name.   Only do ONE post with answers to each question listed below. 

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#1 - Describe an example of a positive culture that you have either experienced as a student or witnessed as a member of a school.  What were the aspects of the culture that made positive impacts on students and staff?

#2 - Conversely, describe an example of a toxic/negative culture that you have either experienced as a student or witnessed as a member of a school.  What were the aspects of the culture that made negative impacts on students and staff?

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A positve culture that I experienced was my high school freshman English class. The teacher was so welcoming and supportive. I retained so much information in that class and was challenged by the teacher. Being from a small, rural school, I was not used to being so challenged by my teachers. However, I can state that being challenged helped me grow so much as an English student.

Ironically, a negative culture that I experienced was my English class my senior year. The teacher was very set on her own opinion and ideas. If you did not think like she did, or agree with what she believed then she would treat you differently. My classmates and I where at the point where we dreaded attending her class.

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1. A positive culture I experienced was in 6th grade. My teacher that year was the sweetest lady. She just had a way of making each student feel special in their own way. There was an incident when we all had to stand up and present to the class individually. As a young child, I was very shy and timid and it terrified me to speak in front of crowds. This particular teacher stood up beside me at the front of the room and presented my project with me and made me feel way more comfortable and helped me out of my shell. She was the best.

2. A negative culture I experienced was in 7th or 8th grade I can't remember exactly. My science teacher at that time was always super negative and not the nicest lady. At this time, I had very long hair. It went down to my waist, it was very long. One day in class I had my hair in my face so I was trying to tie it up so it would be out of my way. She looked at me in front of the entire class and told me she was tired of me messing with my hair and that I needed to cut it all off. I felt so embarrassed and humiliated. After that, it made me feel very self-conscious and I went and got my hair cut short. I will never forget how that made me feel.

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1. A positive culture I've experienced was in 2nd grade. It was when I moved to America and did not know any English. My homeroom teacher was so patient with me and tried her best to help me. She would spend a lot of one on one time with me, give me extra problems, and try her best to explain things to me in a way I would understand. This teacher had a really positive influence on my life and is one of the many reasons I want to be an elementary teacher. As educators, we have such a large influence over our students.

2. A negative culture I've experienced was in my 7th grade ELA class. The teacher was extremely hard on us. This subject was something I struggled with, and instead of helping me, she would give me "lunch detention" and force me to redo my assignments on my lunchtime (every day until I got it correct). This teacher saw my struggle as an act of rebellion. It got to a point where I was afraid to go to her classroom due to the anxiety she caused me and all her other students.

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I remember distinctly in middle school whenever I played football, my coaches were always positive on the field and in the classroom. They weren't bias towards their players in class and always treated me like I was an important factor in their life. When I broke my arm during a game, they were the people to help me to the hospital and made sure I was always taken care of. Even when I was out for the year they still wanted me to be a part of the team.

A negative culture I experienced was in High School and the teachers much like the students would have their cliques. Some teachers also formed cliques with their students and would be bias towards them rather than the students in need of help. I think teachers must have the selfless mindset and that every student deserves the same opportunities.

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1. A positive culture I experienced was with in the library of my high school and with the librarian. My senior year of high school, I was a Library Aid for one period everyday. Because I was constantly spending time in the library, my relationship with the librarian grew very strong. She also created an environment in the library that drew students in and made them want to spend more time in there. There were many students, including myself, that confided in her and saw her as a comfort teacher. She frequently gave advice, cheered students up, and generally created such a wonderful environment.

2. I had a negative experience with my seventh grade Computer Science teacher. This teacher was very judgmental and thought he was coming off as funny and relatable. He thought calling students out and making fun of their efforts was humor. However, it just made us uncomfortable. He also wanted us to laugh at him and make jokes with, and when we didn't, he would make the classwork harder and take it out on the class. The teacher also clearly had favorites, which no student likes. Overall, his classroom was very uncomfortable and many students came out of that class with no new knowledge.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced as a student was in my second and third grade class. I had the same teacher both years and it was very beneficial to me. I always looked forwarded to going to school because my teacher was always positive and kind with a big smile every day. My teacher being in a good mood every day or at least trying to be positive left a positive impact on the class everyday. It made me more eager to learn and more relaxed being in a positive impact.

2. A negative culture moment I witnessed was in college math. The teacher did not ever smile and did not seem like he wanted to be there. He moved fast and never once checked to see if we had questions or understood the lesson. This lead to lots of stress and not looking forward to going to class. I felt miserable in this class because his bad moods and lectures went by slow leading me to not being in the best mood and making it harder to focus.

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1. A positive culture I experienced during school was with my math teacher and a friend of mine. I was really struggling with this certain math class but thankfully my best friend was in the class and really knew what he was doing. My teacher didn't how much I struggled at first but was always showing interest in trying to help me improve my math skills. Thankfully I knew the teacher's son because I used to play sports with him when we were younger, so we had a decent relationship already. After talking to my teacher about how much I struggled, I asked her if it would be possible if I can sit next to my friend to improve even more. She hesitated at first but supported my situation. With my friend and teachers help I ended up with a B in the class.
2. The most negative thing I recall happening to me in high school was with my friends in our biology class. As a young sophomore I was a bit of a troublemaker in this class because all my friends were in the class, and it was this teacher first year teaching. As the lessons would go on in class me and my friends were split up all among the room but would always find a way to the back of the room to talk. This would happen more than often and at one point the teacher had it with me. The teacher happened to pick up all of my belongings out of the classroom and threw them into the hallway in front of everyone after yelling at me. As a student I realized I was misbehaving but there are better ways to go about disciplining students than doing that in front of everyone. That was the first and last year that teacher taught!

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#1
One example of a positive culture that I have experienced as a student was in elementary school. My 3rd grade teacher had a bright and happy classroom with many different outlets from the tables (reading corner, turtle corner, etc.) She came into the classroom everyday in a good mood and exerted it onto her students. When we had work to complete, she would always praised us for what we did right and added constructive feedback with things that needed some work. We would get rewarded with turtle time, where we could play with her turtles or even being rewarded by getting to sit at the reading corner with one other friend. Overall, her positive attitude through her teaching had allowed me to enjoy the class and made her students want to learn and enjoy it also.

#2
One example of a toxic/ negative culture that I have experienced as a student was in one of my middle school english classes. She came off stern and never showed up in a positive atitude, making it hard to like or be excited about the class. She never let students speak and each day we would be told to read a chapter and do the millions of practice sheets that were repetitive and ultimately busy work. Ultimately, the teacher never rooted us on and was negative towards each student leaving a super toxic environment and a place no one wanted to be!

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#1 - A positive culture that I have been able to experience was when I was working for a school this past year. I worked in two different classrooms that were both PREK Sped. One room had students that needed more assistance and guidance in daily routine and activities. The other room had students where many of them were capable of being independent but had more behavioral needs. I was able to be a floater in these classrooms. I took away so much from what I learned. I enjoyed working in the classroom with students that had behavioral issues as there was always something to learn from them. The teacher in that classroom was really good responding to behavior and emotional escalation. Many of our students had autism, a learning delay, learning disabilities, etc. The opportunity to being able to learn how to work with these kids and see them succeed in their own way was truly something I will cherish. One time, I had one student that got really upset because he did not want to do his work that he got very frustrated. I used the first "this" and then "that" method and turned his work into a fun game to help bring his focus back in. He lit up and thought the game we did was fun and he got back on track. One of the aspects of this culture that impacted this environment was having applicable ways of helping a kid, accepting that not all kids learn the same way, and learning how to accommodate for a student to succeed in their own way.

#2 - A negative culture experience I have had was when I was working in the school setting. The school I was working in needed help in the CDC classroom. I was a floater in my grade so they put me in their within the first month of school. This was such a tough and tiring time but yet such a great learning experience. I learned techniques that work sometimes and some that do not work. The teacher was very young and was easily overwhelmed. When kids escalated physically or emotionally, there was not always a calm front in the way teachers and assistants would respond. When this response would be shown, the class was affected by this and would show more. I was in and out of this classroom a lot but grew to know how to handle those situations as best as I could. As a teacher assistant and future college student, it was helpful to see in person how some styles of teaching or behavioral management sometimes works and sometimes does not.

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#1 - An example that I have experienced while working within the school that has provided a positive impact and improved the over all climate of the school is the inclusivity that our special needs students have within the classrooms. Working with one on one with students that have IEPs has opened my eyes to the wide range of students that have accommodations that the other students look over and still interact with as they are any typical student. This inclusion really spreads a positive atmosphere among not only the students but the staff as well. Unique friends join the public school system all the time and it is heartwarming to ensure that all are provided the equal opportunities as all other students.

#2 - A negative aspect of the culture that I have experienced in high school, was a time that our coding class teacher and girls basketball coach had a secret intimate relationship with one of the students on the basketball team. He was immediately terminated due to the unprofessional nature of his relationship, of course. But this meant the basketball coach and a computer coding teacher was now needed. This resulted in a rotation of substitutes until the class was eventually terminated and students were dispersed into other extra curriculars mid way through the semester. I found that entirely unfair, and this left a negative impact on the students and a tense work environment among staff I am sure even though they were sure to not show it.

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1. I've been fortunate enough to experience a lot of really good teaching and class cultures. One that stands out is a professor I had last fall. She was always asking about our personal lives and showing genuine interest. She also brought food and snacks on days that we had a big test. This professor made us feel like she cared about us as people and not just as students.
2. A negative experience I've had was from that same semester. This professor would laugh at questions that she thought were dumb and she wouldn't answer them. Several times people would get an incorrect answer so she would have them try again however many times they wanted. But, they couldn't go to peers for feedback, use a textbook, ask her for answers, or use anything except for whatever they knew. It made learning really difficult knowing that your questions wouldn't be answered and feedback wouldn't be given.

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1. A positive culture I experienced as a student was in my English class my freshman year of high school. I had been homeschooled my whole life up until this point and I was so nervous to start going to public school.  My first class was algebra 1 and I have never been good at anything math related, but my teacher was so welcoming and brought such a fun and inclusive energy into the classroom and it made me have such an open mindset in the class that I ended up really enjoying the course.  It made me realize that a teachers impact can effect your outlook in a subject completely.

2. A negative culture I experienced as a student was in my first English class in college. My teacher was older and you could just tell she really hated her job and thought all her students were beneath her. She spoke to us like we had no knowledge whatsoever and would pick students out and verbally abuse them. She would shame us if we had not heard of certain books or plays and was overall very hard to be around. Even though she was a difficult person, I learned from her how not to be as a teacher, which is still extremely important.

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1. An example of a positive culture in my life was a leadership class in my senior year of high school. Leadership class was a great opportunity to learn how to lead throughout the school and take charge. I learned more than just leadership skills. I learned how to talk and communicate with people, how to stand up for yourself and others, and how to organize and plan events. This class was so much fun. The teacher was almost like having a friend. He was upbeat, positive, outgoing, and most importantly he was charismatic. Building a relationship with such a positive but kind person helped me to branch out and want to do just like him if not better. When having such a positive environment like that in the classroom helps the kids to be more open and comfortable, especially with sharing ideas. He would give constructive criticism without belittling you or making you feel silly. He wouldn't just tell you that you were wrong he would help you through it and provide assistance in a genuine way. A teacher like that is inspiring for young children.

2. A negative cultural example I experienced was the first semester at a community college. I had a BIO 137 class because at the time I was going for Radiology. The first week of school I was unsure how it worked with some classes being online and some in person but we were all together in one blackboard class. The work we would do in class we would have already completed the assignment on blackboard. So when an assignment automatically submitted when I didn't submit anything I panicked. I emailed the professor and she told me "Oops better luck next time" I obviouly did not appreciate that. The way she went about things was belittling and that made me almost disklike doing the work even more. I was scared to ask questions. So then I went to all online because I couldn't handle another semester in person with her, and since I wasn't in person I did worse learning the material online. All around a bad experience and situation.

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1. ) In My senior year of high school I took ENG 102 and it ended up changing my perspective on not just teaching, but life as well. The teacher I had took the time to get to know every student individually, including the shy ones like me. Often I felt overlooked by teachers because I was quiet, but he made the effort to get to know me as a student and as a person. This was one of the first classes I had where I was able to build the courage to speak up and present projects without any fear. I noticed this in other shy students as well, and it was interesting to hear from them because I hadn't heard their thoughts before. In addition to his kindness, he had thought-out lesson plans and assignments. One of our units was dedicated to the concept of success, and during that unit, I was able to determine what it meant to me. For so long I felt like I had to follow a specific path, but I found out that I needed to base my idea of success on what made me happy instead of chasing something that would only make me stress. It was the final push in my decision to pursue teaching/academia, and it's all thanks to him and his classwork.

2.) A negative environment I experienced was 3rd-grade math class. I had a teacher who went out of his way to make it known that he did not like me (even though I was eight). We did rotations in third grade based on our testing scores. I was in the advanced group with other like-minded kids, and most of them were able to keep up with math. I, however, struggle to keep up in math and take time to grasp it. He knew this, and yet he still would often publicly humiliate me when I didn't know the answers right away. Usually, it was just by calling on me when I wasn't raising my hand and getting mad when I didn't know the answer. I have one memory, though, where he called me up to the front of the class to point at a fraction on a line. I didn't know where it was and he berated me and used me as an example of what not to be (all while I was standing up there holding back tears). It wasn't until my mom showed up at the school to talk to him that he finally just stopped talking to me. Thank God I only had him for one class, but I still think I have trauma from it.

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1. A positive culture I experienced as a student was during my senior year of high school in a math class. My teacher would always come extremely prepared, happy to be there, always talked positively about the students. She always was there to help me, answered her emails immediately. She would offer to help me and other students on problems we were stuck on, she would stay after class or have office hours for us. I am very grateful for her; she made my confidence in math skyrocket.

2. A negative culture I have experienced in a classroom was where classmates where afraid to ask any questions, or answer any of the teachers and being wrong, the teacher. He created a tense classroom where no one was comfortable. It also affected our ability to learn and grow as a student.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced in my time at the school setting would be the happy, family type atmosphere our students are met with each day. Our school builds relationships with the children and most of them truly care. It shows throughout the year. The children become trusting, open, and able to learn. Teaching by example on being positive and caring is a major need in our elementary schools and I am incredibly proud of our school for succeeding. No matter how your week was, when we walk I to the building it washes away to be who the kids need us to be. Personally, I have gotten to work with a couple kids who began closed off and had major behavioral disorders who have now surpassed their goals, sit in class regularly and are high test scorers. Seeing that growth is what pushes such a positive culture.
2. A negative culture I have experienced would also be in my work setting in school but earlier on. I had a coworker who was the most negative person I had met. Every morning there were a list of complaints about the kids coming in. Gossip about everyone, opinions on parenting of our students, and flat out negativity. Being surrounded in a culture like that is miserable. It's almost like walking around with a dark cloud hovering over you, no matter how much positivity you try to bring its washed away. It trickled down to the students who in turn acted out. We had violence, physically and mentally by the students and no where to turn for help. You always hear that a positive attitude can change lives but I've seen both sides and know it to be true. Never bring darkness into your students lives, you don't know what they face daily as it is.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced as a student is teachers who make it a priority to build relationships with their students and allow students to build relationships with each other. I have experienced this classroom culture several times and I can confidently say these were the classrooms I learned best in. These teachers create a classroom environment where everyone has a voice and feels comfortable. This allowed students to flourish in the classroom and feel confident while learning.

2. A negative culture I have experienced is a classroom where students are afraid to make any kind of mistake. My third grade teacher made an example out of anyone who made any type of mistake in her classroom. I vividly remember her holding up one of my worksheets and telling the class "This is what not to do". It was a very defining moment in my childhood that affected me for a long time. Her classroom was not a safe space for students. We could not learn for the fear that we may fail trying. This created extreme tension in the classroom which affected our ability to learn and grow as students.

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1. A positive culture I experienced as a student was in a high school English class during my senior year. My teacher was positive upbeat, and always commented positively about my input during the class. He was always available to give immediate feedback to questions and offered assistance or suggestions as we completed writing. By beginning on a positive note and praising student efforts, he could provide assistance without being harsh. His concern for my achievement was evident, and I felt that I was valued as a person. An aspect of the culture that positively impacted students was enabling learning in a calm, no-stress environment.
I have always had test anxiety, and this teacher made assessments a learning tool by allowing us extra attempts to receive a good score. When I did retake a quiz, I paid particular attention to the questions I missed, did research, and learned the content. This teacher knew how to motivate students to learn by removing the stress of a quiz. I benefited by learning so much in this calm, caring environment.

2. I experienced a negative culture in an online class last semester. At the beginning of the course, I had difficulty identifying the content that needed to be studied because there was so much material. I studied for 9 hours daily and had no time for other courses. I contacted the instructor for guidance, who told me he did not have time to respond and that I should study the material. I sent multiple emails asking specific questions about the content with no response or a mass email negatively addressing all students. Mid-semester, I realized I was on my own and dropped the class. I feel that the professor had no concern for my academic success. This was my first year back in college after 12 years, and I needed a more positive environment with support. The aspect of a non-caring culture had negative effects on my achievement.

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1. A positive culture I experienced was in my AP Chem class in high school. My teacher was always there to talk and help you in any way. She made sure we knew the content and if we didn't she would work with us individually so we could get a better understanding. She went out of her way to have a relationship with each student and really cared about us. Her classroom was always a safe space and no one felt scared to ask for help. She really helped all of us feel confident in our ability to learn. She often offered advice or study tips for other subjects as well. I am so grateful for her.

2. A negative culture I experienced was from my Spanish teacher my senior year of high school. He had favorites that were very obvious, and would often give them more grace for things than he would other students. On more than one occasion he was overheard talking bad about other students to his favorite students. His class had little to no structure and most of us did not enjoy being in there. He often talked about other subjects during his class instead of doing lessons. It did not feel like a safe and successful learning environment.

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1: A positive culture I have experienced as a student in school was throughout middle and high school. I have always struggled in my math classes and had teachers who never knew I was struggling because they did not care. So once I got to my senior year I had two math classes and I did not know what to do. One day during my senior year when I had a class called transitional math. I had that teacher and she noticed that I was struggling and she helped after school until I understood the lesson that she was teaching.
2: A negative culture that I experienced in elementary school. I always had a teacher who did not care about their students. This was in my last year of elementary school when I figured out that the teacher was not paying attention.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced as a student is in my 4th grade math class I always struggled in math and in her class I was struggling a bunch and having trouble doing/finishing my work. I also never spoke out when I was having trouble so I'm really thankful my teacher noticed I was having trouble in her class and tutored me during lunch time to help me better understand and catch up with the other students. I also really liked the environment she had in her class. It was overall really positive and it was a judge-free zone. Thanks to her I gave math another chance and it is my new favorite school subject.

2. A negative culture I experienced as a student is when I was in 7th grade I had a science teacher that I didn't enjoy learning from. I never liked science and still don't so taking her class every day already stressed me out. This was also during Covid-19 so we needed to finish our assignment on our Chromebook sometimes at home and sometimes at school. When I needed help she gave me very little help and always expected me to know everything. I felt like her teaching only made it harder to learn.

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1. A positive culture I experienced as a student was in biology class in my Sophomore year. My teacher's name was Natalie Copass. I had her for the first period and she was always positive with a good attitude. She was always willing to help her students with anything they need. She always had fun activities to go with her lesson and made the class fun. She always gave her students her full attention and involves all her students in everything she does.
2. A negative culture I experienced as a student was my English class sophomore year. The content and work were not hard but the teacher made the class hard. She picked favorites and made the class difficult to understand. She picked on the kids who weren't her favorites and made it hard to feel comfortable in her class.

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1. A positive culture I experienced was last year in my Algebra CP class. It was my first year in high school. Algebra was my second period of the day. At the beginning of the year, I was nervous and felt that I would struggle in that class, but my teacher made sure that no one would fall behind or struggle in his classroom. He would not stop helping anyone until they understood how to do it. He never gave up on his students and was determined to help them succeed. His class was the best. I could talk and ask questions whenever I felt like speaking and I could solve problems well. The environment made everyone feel welcome and anyone could be themselves.

2. A negative culture that I experienced was when I was in 7th grade in my English class. I never felt comfortable in that classroom. It was hard for me and even other students to ask questions or be themselves in that class. She didn't believe in her students and what they were capable of. This affected the students learning because they were not in a safe environment.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced as a student is that my 5th teacher, she always made sure everyone was trying and that we never gave up and she was just the best teacher ever and she was just always there for me and she have helped me with a lot of things and my both of my 3rd grade teachers, they was the best and they always there to help and they was the nicest teacher and they all just always helped me and got me though a lot of things in school and the made me really like going to school but all of my elements teachers was  amazing but my 3rd grade teachers and my 5th teacher was the best ever and I miss them so much and I just miss going to school and seeing them. My math and steam teacher from 8th was one of the best because they never gave up and they were always just there to help and  my math, she really helped me to get better at math and to understand it better and they all just made me feel really comfortable to talk to them about things.

2. A negative culture I have was one of my 6th grade History teacher because she never really did teach us anything and she would always just talk about her family problems and nothing else and I did not learn anything from her class and we did nothing in her class but I think one project in her class the whole year and

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1. A positive culture I've experienced as a high school student is with my art teacher/softball coach. One aspect of the culture is I was able to talk to her about anything, and I always felt comfortable and if I needed anything at all she didn't hesitate to help me. She would most importantly help with all my assignments and projects if I needed it, but we were also able to laugh and talk about things not school related.  She helped me through relationship troubles, family issues and anything else you can think of she was there. I had a very bad experience with my former softball coaches in middle school, and she helped me to love the sport again.
2. A negative culture I experienced was with my sophomore year English teacher. She didn't make me feel comfortable enough to ask for help, and I dreaded going to her class every day. She favored the more popular students and treated the other students differently. She would talk to students in a sarcastic tone if they had a question, and just be rude in general.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced as a student was my Advisory Class sophomore year. Every day when I would walk in the class a smile would bright up on my face. My teacher always made me feel welcome and made me feel like I could talk to him about anything. Advisory class was the time of the day that we would use to work on our late work for other classes. I would always let him read my papers and go over my assignments because I trusted him to tell me the truth on how they were.
2. A negative culture I have experienced as a student would be my English class my sophomore year. The work in the class was not hard, nor was the content. The teacher of the class made it hard on all of her students. She did not help us understand the algorithm or try to make it easy for us to learn the content. She picked her favorites and picked on her least favorites. This made it very hard for us students to learn and to feel comfortable learning in her classroom.

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1. A positive culture I have experienced as a student is that my AP Statistics teacher would never let me just fail an exam, quiz, etc. I really struggled in that course, but he would continue to make different variations of the exams and assign me practice work until I was finally able to improve in some way. He said that education is not about perfection, it is about growth. This really made me realize that growth is learning, and that everyone is not going to get every question right. Education is all about making improvements to reach the bigger goal.

2. A negative culture I have witnessed is from a teacher at my former school changed my mind on what an educator should be. One of my best friends from high school was struggling in this particular teacher’s course, and instead of giving my friend some guidance or asking what she could do to help my friend grow, she looked at her in front of our entire friend group and told her that she should rethink her future career choice (teaching), and just get a job at Walmart. I watched those words loom over my friend for the rest of the school year. Words matter, and as an educator it is crucial to remember that.

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1. A positive culture I experienced as a student was in my AP US History class. At the beginning of the year, the teacher said that we would be writing papers at the end of each month, however, as a Junior, we had lots of prep work for the ACT and end-of-year testing, and seeing this stress that we were under, he decided to skip a few essays. This relief of work greatly improved student morale and allowed us to take a well-needed mental health break.

2. A negative culture I experienced as a student was in my Sophomore math class. This teacher did not know how to pace a lesson and filled the first 20 minutes of class with information that was not useful to the class, such as photography, or journaling. This caused us to be behind on our lesson, for which she blamed us for. She also publicly called us out when we did not understand something, causing severe anxiety. Many students did not end up passing and had to retake the class, through no fault of their own.

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1. A positive culture I experienced while in high school was with my school principal. Every time I would pass him in the hallway, he would greet me and then ask how I was doing.  He never let anyone pass by him without saying something to them. He would always make sure that anyone he came into contact with always smiling after their encounter. Not only that but he made sure everyone started their day off on a positive note and a smile on their face.

2. A toxic culture that I experienced while in middle school was with my eighth-grade science teacher. She spent majority of class time talking about her personal life, which in turn left little to no time for teaching content. She did not give students enough time to work on certain projects that had to be completed in class, I and many others missed the deadline for a major project. Therefore, I ended up almost failing her class.

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#1 - One positive culture that I have experienced as a student in High School was in my AP Calculus class. The teacher we had would constantly check in on us, ask about our days, and see what we did on the weekends. She was also very gracious when it came to assignments and attendance. She set clear expectations but then was understanding and helpful when life threw people curve balls. She was an excellent teacher, but she also cared about her students, and they could feel it. It felt like a very safe environment, and everyone always knew they could talk to her if something was wrong.

#2- One negative culture that I have experienced as a student in college was in my Calc 2 class. My professor would call people out constantly and make fun of them if they were wrong. He would contently ask us to ask questions but whenever we did, he would make us feel really stupid for asking it. He would constantly say the curriculum was easy and he would use the word "Obviously" a lot when explaining things. It made students feel unappreciated and stupid and it also made students afraid to ask questions.

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1. A positive culture that I experienced as a student was with my geography teacher during my freshman year of high school. Freshman year was a scary new beginning, and I always had trouble with school starting. She created an environment where I could talk to her about my struggles and I would be met with guidance and understanding. One aspect of this environment that helped students was that she would never judge us for struggling or being nervous. This made us feel better about being in a new and unfamiliar place. Another aspect that was helpful in this environment was that she always had time for students. She could be on her computer when we walked in and she would either stop instantly or finish what she was doing and give us her full attention. This made students feel seen and important. Being supported in these ways is essential when you are struggling.

2. A toxic culture that I experienced as a student was with my government teacher during my junior year of high school. She would constantly gossip about/with students and faculty. One aspect of this culture that negatively impacted the environment was that her gossip would always spread and would end up hurting some feelings. A school needs to feel like a safe environment, so when a teacher is heard gossiping about your peers it can be alarming. Another aspect of this culture that had a negative impact was that a lot of students lost respect for her because of this. When you do not respect your teacher it is hard to be able to learn from them effectively. This made her class much harder and less pleasant for many people.

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1. A positive culture that I experienced as a student was in the third grade. My teacher's name was Ms. Cook. She was so bright every morning when I would walk in to the class. You never knew if she was having a bad day or if something was bothering her. She was always willing to explain things in different ways until each student understood what she was teaching. She taught us that learning could be fun with the different styles of teaching. She would also love to play basketball with her students. When we would read a certain series of books she would always bring in her cat for the day and he would hang out in the classroom.

2. A negative culture that I recently experienced was a teacher that I had previously been an instructional assistant to. She often spent most of the day yelling at the students, talking down to some of them, and making very rude comments. There were kids in there who needed to have a little more attention and guidance in the class and it was as if she didn't have the time for that. As a mom who had a child to come out of this teachers classroom it was very heartbreaking to see and to think that this was how he had been treated. I was glad to be able to be in there and show the kids some love.

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1. One positive culture I experienced personally was during high school while I was a student. My high school history teacher would greet everyone, give advice to students who asked, and always made sure all students understood the topics before moving on. He really created an extremely healthy environment.
environment

2. I had a horrible learning environment in a different classroom thanks to a different history teacher in high school. She came across as ill-prepared, lazy, and as if she never wanted to be there. While we got to watch movies CONSTANTLY and copy notes straight from PowerPoints which we can use on tests, we never learned anything. She would sleep when we watched movies, always had a monotone voice, dresses unprofessionally, and overall just had a negative vibe. It hindered our learning because her attitude rubbed off on all of us and we became lazy and watched movies all day.

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1. A positive culture I experienced while I was in high school was with my agriculture teacher. She always had a positive attitude and students were able to go to her about anything. She always found a way to make the work engaging. Thus, making her class fun and one that I wanted to go too. One thing she did specifically was in the morning, she would ask everyone how they were doing and one thing they did over the weekend. This was a nice way to start off Monday mornings.
2. A negative culture that I experienced in high school was with the principle. While he wasn't in every class nor did he teach any of my classes, the way he interacted with students really set the mood for the school. He had his favorites and if you weren't one of them he wouldn't make much of an effort to talk to you or offer his help when needed. He often shared his opinion wether it was positive or negative about students choices specifically career wise. He also gets overwhelmed very easy and showed that to the students in the school by how he acted toward them often being rude or negative. This caused students to not enjoy coming to school as much as they should have.

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1. A positive culture I experienced as a student occurred when I was in high school, with my freshman and sophomore math teacher.
One aspect of the culture she created within the classroom was how she created a healthy classroom environment by being an outlet to help each and every student with WHATEVER problems they ran into on a day to day basis.
Another aspect of classroom culture she instrumented was shown through the group assignments and group projects in which gave the class a way to work together with each and every person with an opportunity to get to know them individually.
She made her assignments enjoyable while somewhat challenging to push us to become better students, and better people.

2. A negative environment that I experienced as a student was in my fifth grade social studies class.
This classroom environment was conversely more hectic due to the students within my class, as some people in the class were kids that got into a lot of trouble.
As a result, the teacher within our class continually got fed up with the class because of the actions of a few within the class, causing for us to lose time learning and being punished as a whole class.
She sometimes made negative comments to our class, saying things such as "we'll never succeed."
In this learning environment, it was not a healthy environment to learn or to be successful in because of the classmates around myself, and due to the lack of support from the teacher to at least steer some of the students who wanted to learn in the right direction.