ORGANIZED TEACHING

Organized Teaching: Calendar Wall Materials

The start of the month always seems to surprise me with its quick arrival, so I like to prepare and organize each month supplies before the start of the school year.  That way, once the calendar wall is set up, all I need to do is "change out" a few things.  The items that get changed out are stored in an expanding-file.  All other day-to-day items are stored near the calendar wall.  

What	Pictures	Explanations
Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow Number Cards		I bought the magnetic wire, rectangular baskets from Wal-Mart at some point in time.  The cards were printed on cardstock 4 years ago, and will be used for another year next year.  Maybe then, I'll print a new set.  I didn't laminate the cards.  Behind the cards you see cupcake stickers.  These are for our Birthday Graph.
Today's Date Calendar Cards
Today's Date Place Value Straws		Soup cans hold our straws (days of the week and days of school).  I add some rubber bands around the cans for when we need to make bundles of 10 straws.  The cans just sit on the chalkboard ledge.
Today's Day of School Straws
Today's Date Penny		A baby food jar houses our days of the month pennies.
Schedule Cards: (download)		In the upper left hand corner of the calendar wall picture, you can see our pocket chart schedule.  This is attached to our chalkboard using those foam, adhesive squares.  The "cards" are actually printed on business cards, laminated, and then attached to business card magnets.  Not all the schedule cards are used every day, so unused cards are just stacked on one of the chalkboard ledges.  I've made my schedule cards available for download.  You can tweak them to fit your needs.  I try to use "real" student pictures when possible.
Monthly-to-Month Change-Overs		The start of the month seems to roll around more quickly than the previous month did!  It never ceases to amaze me that "it's that time again" - -and I need to change the calendar to the new month.  To make the change over as painless as possible, I organize every month in an expanding file folder.  Each month is in it's own section and contains the monthly tally chart, monthly die cuts for the monthly calendar, die cuts for the days of the school year number line, and title and year print outs of the monthly calendar.  This makes the change over pretty easy. There is a section in the back of the expanding file folder for the extra month and year cards from our "Today Is' sentence strip on the calendar.
Other....		The chalkboard ledge also houses black fine-point markers for when students need to write the date on the monthly calendar cut outs, days of school die cuts, and make tallies on the monthly tally mark sheet.  We also keep a glue stick on the ledge for attaching the die cuts to the monthly calendar, and a glue stick for attaching the 100s Day puzzle piece to the puzzle.