Question to American teachers

J.W. · Oct 21, 2013

I'm currently doing some research on something, that is called "Lehrerraumprinzip" in German. It basically means that a schoolteacher has his own room at school and all students come to his class, instead of the other way around, as it is still the case in most German schools. Here, the students have their own classroom and the teachers go there in order to teach. Only science lessons are taught in special classrooms, so the German system can be called student-centered.
In the U.S., teachers usually have a classroom of their own, which they can decorate and equip to their needs and keep their teaching material for quick access. But is there a special term for this? "Lehrerraumprinzip" translates roughly as "teacher room principle". I'm not talking about homeroom, where teachers take attendance and look after organizational matters.
I wouldn't be surprised to find that this is another German peculiarity, whereas the rest of the world simply calls this "classroom". Then again: because it is the normal thing in the U.S. for teachers to have their own classroom, there might not be the need to find a special term for it.
"Gary" or "Platoon" model might be going into the right direction, but I've still got to have a closer look at these.
Hope someone here can help me solve the question.

sheeplady · Oct 21, 2013

I am not a teacher, so what I say is what it is worth.

I know in some small public schools the teachers do rotate. That is exactly what I have always heard it called, "teachers rotating." For instance, a small rural school where I grew up that often had graduating classes of 20 students or less had each grade in a classroom and the teachers rotated for the upper (secondary) grades. I believe they might have had a single science room that the students went to. But obviously, that's pretty rare because most schools here are much larger.

For public school's lower grades (primary school) it isn't uncommon to have art, music, etc. (specialty teachers) rotate from classroom to classroom with their supplies on a cart. For primary school, typically Kindergarten and first through fifth (sometimes sixth) the students are with one primary teacher in one classroom. I imagine in schools with more funding, they might have separate "art classrooms" and "music classrooms" but I've never seen that in any school district in which I've lived in and I pay a lot of attention to public education.

I'm not sure if this idea came from Gary or not. I know I've never heard the word "platoon" used outside of my education classes (I took a lot of teacher education courses while doing a Masters in instructional design). It does seem like it is an accurate description, except for the fact that in "platoons" my understanding was that the students all stayed in a group- so for instance- you were with the same 30 students as a group all day as you moved from place to place. In most cases, students don't stay in a group when they are changing classrooms. For instance, I might have had math first period with Sally, Max, and Tom but never see them again in a day because for the rest of my classes I am with other students- who I might never see for any other class. Likewise, I might have physical education with students from all grades in a secondary school (9-12 grades) but never have another class with them other than phys ed.

So no, I've never heard a different term for the stationary teachers who have their own classrooms. Sorry I'm not much more help. But if anything I've said confuses you more, please let me know.

sheeplady · Oct 21, 2013

Oh, another thing I thought of that might shed light on this and explain some of the differences:

In most cases in the U.S., students are no longer "tracked" unlike in many other countries. The ideal classroom for primary school (at least) is the idea that there are students at all levels: below average in grades, average, and above average. Tracking is where these students might be separated into two or three classrooms by ability level. In the case of upper grades (secondary school) there are often classes for different ability levels- for example- average performing math students may be placed in one class, stellar math students might be placed into a higher grade class for math, and other students may be placed into remedial math. Because this is done for many subjects (typically math and science at the very least) student's rotating allows for the best placement into different class needs.

I don't know if students are tracked in your country or not. (I will say that the idea of tracking here is seen rather negatively in education for various reasons.)

For instance, I might have math with Sally, Max, and Tom because we're all average math students in 10th grade. Then I might go onto what we called "general" science education (typically for students who were lower performing in the sciences) and Sally and Max go onto music class (because that best fits their schedule) and Tom goes into honors (high performing students) science class. Because we aren't tracked together tightly, not all the high performers are in one class and therefore all offered higher content, etc.

rjb1 · Oct 21, 2013

For what it's worth, at the university level in the US neither the students nor the teachers have any designated rooms. We all wander around the building into whatever rooms the school registrar has put us.
In high school all the teachers had their own rooms and we moved to where they were. I don't remember this system having any particular name or label associated with it.
We have a very-highly-rated teacher education college associated with the larger university here. You night do a search on "Peabody College Vanderbilt University" and find someone there who is an expert on what you are looking for.

HudsonHawk · Oct 22, 2013

sheeplady said:
I am not a teacher, so what I say is what it is worth.

I know in some small public schools the teachers do rotate. That is exactly what I have always heard it called, "teachers rotating." For instance, a small rural school where I grew up that often had graduating classes of 20 students or less had each grade in a classroom and the teachers rotated for the upper (secondary) grades. I believe they might have had a single science room that the students went to. But obviously, that's pretty rare because most schools here are much larger.

For public school's lower grades (primary school) it isn't uncommon to have art, music, etc. (specialty teachers) rotate from classroom to classroom with their supplies on a cart. For primary school, typically Kindergarten and first through fifth (sometimes sixth) the students are with one primary teacher in one classroom. I imagine in schools with more funding, they might have separate "art classrooms" and "music classrooms" but I've never seen that in any school district in which I've lived in and I pay a lot of attention to public education.

I'm not sure if this idea came from Gary or not. I know I've never heard the word "platoon" used outside of my education classes (I took a lot of teacher education courses while doing a Masters in instructional design). It does seem like it is an accurate description, except for the fact that in "platoons" my understanding was that the students all stayed in a group- so for instance- you were with the same 30 students as a group all day as you moved from place to place. In most cases, students don't stay in a group when they are changing classrooms. For instance, I might have had math first period with Sally, Max, and Tom but never see them again in a day because for the rest of my classes I am with other students- who I might never see for any other class. Likewise, I might have physical education with students from all grades in a secondary school (9-12 grades) but never have another class with them other than phys ed.

So no, I've never heard a different term for the stationary teachers who have their own classrooms. Sorry I'm not much more help. But if anything I've said confuses you more, please let me know.

This is pretty much the way it was for any school I ever attended. In Elementary school, we stayed in one class with one primary teacher, with the exception of music class. Beginning in Jr. High (7th grade for me), the students moved to different classrooms for each class. Either way, the teacher had a dedicated classroom.

J.W. · Oct 22, 2013

Yes, but is there an official term for the dedicated classroom for the teacher? I'm really beginning to believer there isn't and that we Germans are just overdoing it again...

HudsonHawk · Oct 22, 2013

J.W. said:
Yes, but is there an official term for the dedicated classroom for the teacher? I'm really beginning to believer there isn't and that we Germans are just overdoing it again...

I've never heard of one. It's pretty standard, so they just call it a "classroom".

1961MJS · Oct 22, 2013

J.W. said:
Yes, but is there an official term for the dedicated classroom for the teacher? I'm really beginning to believer there isn't and that we Germans are just overdoing it again...

Hi

There probably isn't a word for it in the US, but you can be assured that some doofus will make up a new word for it because they need something to write a thesis on for their PhD in Education.

Sorry, my Dad gave me a rundown on his first 20 years of teaching, basically you have two ways to group the 12 year old kids (for example). You can dump them all together, or separate them using their knowledge level. These have been called Homogenous, then they went to non-homogenous, then to Equal, then to structured grouping, then... These were changed because somebody had done their Doctoral thesis on the new group word of the year.

Old and Jaded...

J.W. · Oct 22, 2013

Well, not a PhD in Education, but a BA thesis in didactics...

Thanks for your help, from what I've found out so far, there really is no technical term for it in English, like we have one in German.

Baron Kurtz · Oct 22, 2013

I think you're right. No differentiation is made, so far as I understand, between types of classroom in the USA or UK, though both type of classroom are used in different situations - primary vs secondary school, for example.

Tomasso · Oct 22, 2013

I recall the term departmental used for students moving between classroom/subjects.

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