Classroom "Before" Pictures and Summer Progress



 

When school ended in May, I took everything down off of my walls and bulletin boards.  I knew I was going to completely re-decorate in the fall, so when I returned to put some things into my room, it looked pretty sad and empty.

 

However, it was kind of nice to have a clean slate to start with (minus having to move all the heavy tables).  This is the view of my classroom from the front of the room.  The panoramic view distorts it a bit, but it is the only way to get everything in one picture.  Excuse the mess! I promise, it did not look this bad when I left, but they moved everything to clean carpets and tile.

 



 
I have 15 student tables, a big rectangle table, and a 5-sided table that I work at with small groups of students.  You can see my filing cabinet at the right of the top photo--I tried to move it when I was there, but the giant thing just won't fit anywhere else in the room because I have sinks, lockers, doors, etc. in the way, and I don't want to block even more of the window.  The door on the right leads into the hall, and the door on the back left leads into one of my teammate's classrooms.  My bookshelf is hidden behind the door leading into his room.

This is the view from the back of the classroom where the movable wall is.  Again, I don't have lots of wall space here because of my whiteboard/projector screen, plus the lockers and the door into another classroom on our team.  You can see my one tiny bulletin board behind my desk on the right!  It doesn't get much attention because it is back in the corner, but it holds my calendar and usually pictures/cards that the students have made for me.

Those are the dreaded before shots.  Now, here is what I accomplished in the one afternoon that I was at the school:

I accidentally forgot one set of borders for the back wall before I took this photo, but you get the gist.  I used all black fabric and solid color polka-dot borders in rainbow colors.   I keep my tables in groups for most of the year, except when we are testing.  It is easier to do labs that way, and honestly, it is too cramped when I have long rows.  My odd-shaped table for small group work goes right where I am standing in the photo at the front of the middle table.

You can also see my calendar board and my little area over near the window.  Here is a close-up!

 
I also forgot the velcro dots for my calendar, so I couldn't hang the numbers up just yet. I need to find something else to put around my calendar so that this board doesn't look so empty. The calendar set I used is from SchoolBox--it is called "Dots on Turquoise" and is available here! The border matches the calendar set and is called the "Dots on Turqoise Pennant Banner"--it also came from SchoolBox and can be purchased on their website here. 

 

Here is the area that keeps me from going crazy!  All of my office supplies stay in the cart on the right.  The fridge is a new addition to my room this year, and my microwave sits right on top.  My area is cramped, I know..but my room is small, and because I have three doors, lockers, and the big row of sinks, I don't really have a good place to put things.  I only sit at my desk during planning anyway, so it doesn't bother me.

 

Here is a close-up of the back wall after I hung up the last set of borders:

 

 

I love the way it turned out.  I haven't been back to hang up posters or anything yet, but it's a start!  I also got the inside of my filing cabinet organized, all of the new supplies from my previous post put away, and the bookshelf organized.  Next time I will show you how I got all of my supplies organized with a little inspiration from Pinterest!

 

 



 

Getting Ready for August--School Supply Shopping!!

One of my goals for the 2013-2014 school year is to blog about my classroom.  There are two major reasons:

• I want to help spread great ideas for the classroom.  I love teaching blogs--I use them all the time for new ideas.  My hope is that someone might find my blog useful as well and I can be part of this community.
• I'd like to have a record of things that I do--be able to look back on things that worked, things that didn't, and use this as a tool to plan from year to year.  I think I might be able to use this as an "artifact" in my professional development.

With that said--- it's almost time for us to return to school.  I have been hitting up the Back-to-School sales and getting things ready at home and in my class.  Here in Georgia, we seem to go back to school before everyone else in the country--I think it is customary everywhere else to return after Labor Day.  I return on Wednesday, the 31st of July for pre-planning, my new students register for the year that Friday (the 2nd), and school starts the next Wednesday (the 7th). 
 
I will post a little bit more about myself and my classroom later, but for now, I wanted to share some of the items I have picked up for my room this year.
 
I LOVE school supplies (as I have noticed so many of us educators do!).  I was just waiting for Wal-Mart to put out the new supplies for the year because I needed to stock up on lots of items, namely art supplies. I am not finished yet, but here is what I have picked up so far.
 

 

 

During the school sales at Wal-Mart I like to stock up--I notice that before the second semester starts in January, they do not have these sales, so I wanted to make sure I had enough for the whole year so I don't have to spend more to re-stock halfway through.

 

Most of these items were less than $1.00.  I think the only things that were more were the Expo markers--I belive they were $2.50. Things shown above include:

 

Crayola markers (skinny and regular)

Crayola colored pencils

Crayola crayons

Super Sticky Post-its

Index cards

Expo markers

Glue sticks

  

 

That was my first trip to the store.  A few days later, they had finished putting out the rest of the supplies and I picked up some more things:

 

 

I was pretty excited about the small packs of Crayolas in this picture. I have never seen these before--they are packs of 8 crayons with all of the crayons belonging to the same color family.  I picked up packs of red, green, blue, and neons.  Here is a close-up of the packaging:

 

 

 
 

 

 

I have already purchased the normal 24-pack crayons for my group supply baskets, but I had to have these when I saw them.  In science we tend to use lots of green, red, and blue, and there are only a couple of those in each box.  This way, I have plenty of the colors that I need and not lots of extras of those colors nobody ever uses (I'm talking to you, white/brown/orange/gray crayons!)  They have a box for each color (even a set of pastels!), but I didn't think the other shades would be as useful.  You can look at these on the Crayola website and see all of the packs they offer, but so far, the only place I have seen them for purchase is Wal-Mart.

 

Other items from the picture above:

 

Large pencil boxes (for group supplies)

Small pencil boxes (for group supplies)

Zippered pencil pouches (for an organizing project)

Red pens

3-ring binder (to set up a model binder)

Notebook dividers

Composition book (to set up a model interactive science notebook)

 

 

Those were all of the supply items I had purchased, and then my mom got a few things for my classroom that she had heard me talk about. 

 

I wanted a separate clipboard for each class period this year, so when she saw these awesome animal print ones, she knew I would love them.  It worked out perfectly, because there are four designs and I have four academic classes.  I believe she found these at Wal-Mart, too--I must have missed them when I was there!

 

She also purchased lots of extra pencils and paperclips--because I always need paperclips and the kids always need pencils! 

 

 

Thanks for reading my blog if you've made it this far!  Next time, I will give you a preview of my room (with some boring "before" pics and some in progress pictures as well).  In the meantime--leave a comment and let me know--What kinds of things are you guys finding to help get your classrooms ready for the new year?  Am I missing out on some "must-haves" that you have found?