Whether you have seen him around or not, Mr. Salerno has become a friendly face in the Victor Senior High Science Department, specifically Physics. Prior to this year, you might have seen him in his prep room, where he stored all of his materials, or pushing a cart going from classroom to classroom.
This is Mr. Salerno’s third year teaching at Victor. He has been teaching for a total of 35 years, so you could say he really likes teaching Physics!
Thirty-two of those years were spent at other places, including Lake Shore Central High School. Fortunately this year, Mr Salerno got to move into his own classroom here at Victor Senior High School.
Even though he has only been teaching here for three years, Mr. Salerno has made a great impact teaching various science classes. He has a lot on his plate this year, teaching Physics, Optics, and now AP Physics C! This year is definitely the year to be able to station himself in his own room.
As you can imagine, there are some difficulties that come with not having your own classroom and having to travel. With many sciences classes, especially a very hands-on class like Physics, demos and using equipment to explain concepts is essential to the learning of students.
Having to travel between classes and only being able to bring a certain amount of stuff made it very hard for Mr. Salerno to efficiently conduct class. “You lose five minutes and the beginning and end of every period”.
Unfortunately, the set up process when not in your own room can be hard, especially if you’re in a math classroom! Sometimes, Mr. Salerno would have to teach out of a math classroom.
This really impacted the learning environment for students. Math classrooms lack some of the basic things students would need when taking a science class. Learning science from a math classroom can definitely take away from what students are learning.
Now teaching AP Physics C, Mr. Salerno has a lot of different things going on in his day, and lots of different equipment needed. Since this is a college level class, the expectations of the students are very high. “You can’t get by with inferior equipment”, so being able to have everything in one classroom really helps keep the transition from each different class smooth and painless.
“You think of something and you do it, it used to be you think of something and you talk about it”. One of the biggest difficulties about not having your own classroom is the fact that you don’t have all of your materials. Since getting his own classroom at Victor, Mr. Salerno has been able to conduct his classes much more successfully and easily. He now has all of his equipment at his fingertips, “when something comes up, you know where to find everything… you know it’s all there”.
If you have gotten the chance to see Mr. Salerno’s new room in room number 271, then you probably have noticed how decorated it is. He wanted to make it feel comfortable, like you’re actually in a Physics classroom. Everywhere you look is Physics!
You might be wondering if there is anything a teacher might miss about having a mobile cart and traveling. “Socially, I’m seeing fewer teachers… I’m just paving a way from my classroom to the faculty room”. Traveling between 4 different classrooms gave the opportunity for lots of social interactions between teachers and students. If there is one thing Mr. Salerno misses, it’s seeing staff and students in the hallways. “I’m making up for it though, the students now know where to find me”.
