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Organizing Your Classroom
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| Students | Teachers | ||
| Notebooks, Binders, & Workbooks | Student Supply Boxes | Music CDs | Teacher Supplies |
| Calendar Wall | Literacy Center Materials | Memos, Handbooks, & Paperwork | Lesson Plans |
| Book Bins | Math Materials | Work Area and/or Desk | Guest Teacher Plans |
| Student Desks and/or Tables | Homework: projects, sheets, bags, calendars | Attendance | Emergency Procedures |
| 1 | 1 | Student Notes | Scholastic Book Clubs |
| 1 | 1 | Labels, Labels, Labels | Student Data: lunch/milk count, class list, attendance, grades, assessments, etc. |
| 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
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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 |  |
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| 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 |  |
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| Today's Date Penny |  |
A baby food jar houses our days of the month pennies. |
Schedule Cards:
(download) |
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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.... | 
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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 glue dots for attaching the 100s Day puzzle piece to the puzzle. |
Notebooks, Binders, & Workbooks:
My classroom has tables, so finding "homes" for notebooks, binders, and workbooks is necessary.
| What | Pictures | Explanations |
| Poetry Journals | 
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| Working with Words Journals | 
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| Writer's Workshop Journals |
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| Calendar Math Journals |
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| Bee Books |  |
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My classroom has tables, and I don't like to store things on the tables, so we have storage boxes that I supply for students.
| What | Pictures | Explanations |
| Storage Boxes | 
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My classroom has tables. Even when I taught 1st grade, I had tables, and prefer them to desks. Why? Because I can save space in the classroom by having tables instead of desks. You see, the tables serve two purposes. I have 9 square and circle tables. They are both student work spaces and literacy corner areas (centers). You can see pictures of my classroom on the "classroom tour" page, or take a look at the map I've created below.
Literacy Corner (center) Materials:
Do I organize by skill or by area? Well, that is a very good question. I guess you have to do what makes sense for you. That, for me, means that I organize them by area. You see, my Literacy Corners (centers) pretty much all have activities that focus on the same skills, so to organize them by skill wouldn't make much sense for my classroom. Instead, I organize my activities and materials by area. I have 10 Literacy Corners (centers) and not every activity is out at the same time, so I need a two storage facilities - - (1) to store activities when they are not being used at the moment, both during the year and summer months, and (2) to store activities that are being used by students at the moment.
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Now, my room has a great, wonderful, fantastic wall of shelves, but they aren't really ideal for student use, so I naturally store my "non used" activities on those. Each Literacy Corner has 1 (or 2) shelves. I like this system because each month or every so often when I need to add additional activities or store old activities, I can easily find what I'm looking for. |
For activities and materials that are being used by students, I we use portable carrying cases so that activities/materials can be brought to the Literacy Corner, because not every Literacy Corner has space near it to house/store activities. Besides, my book bin shelves (white shelves) can house laundry baskets underneath them, making it very easy for students to pull the needed basket and carry it to their Literacy Corner.
| What | Pictures | Explanations |
| ABC Literacy Corner |  |
Students sit at a table, or work on the floor near the table when working with ABC activities. The activities are stored in rolling bin carts, hardware drawer units, and book bins next to the table. In addition, some activities are also stored in laundry tubs that are clearly labeled and housed on the white shelving units that hold the book bins - - students carry the tubs to their work area. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my ABC Literacy Corner page. |
| Working with Words Literacy Corner | 
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Students sit at a table when working with Working with Words activities. The activities are stored in laundry tubs that are clearly labeled and housed on the white shelving units that hold the book bins - - students carry the tubs to their work area. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my Working with Words Literacy Corner page. |
| Felt Board Literacy Corner | 
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Students work at the felt board next to the Felt Board center table when working with Felt Board activities. The activities are stored in laundry tubs that are clearly labeled and housed on the white shelving units that hold the book bins - - students carry the tubs to their work area. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my Felt Board Literacy Corner page. |
| Listening Center Literacy Corner | 
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Students sit at a table when working with Listening Center activities. The activities are stored in laundry tubs that are clearly labeled and housed on the white shelving units that hold the book bins - - students carry the tubs to their work area. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my Listening Center Literacy Corner page. |
| Writing Literacy Corner | 
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Students sit at a table, when working with Writing activities. The activities and supplies for the writing center are are stored in pull out drawer units that are clearly labeled and housed on the writing center cart that is next to the writing center table. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my Writing Literacy Corner page. |
| Magnet Board Literacy Corner | 
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Students work at the Expanded Royal Reading and Writing Center Easel when working with Magnet Board activities. The activities are stored in laundry tubs that are clearly labeled and housed on the white shelving units that hold the book bins - - students carry the tubs to their work area. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my Magnet Board Literacy Corner page. |
| Pocket Chart Literacy Corner | 
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Students sit at a table, or work on the floor near the table when working with Pocket Chart activities. The activities are stored in pull out drawers that are clearly labeled and housed on the white shelving units that hold the pocket chart letter cards (yellow hardware drawer units). Sentence strip poems are stored on hooks next to the area. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my Pocket Chart Literacy Corner page. |
| Fine Motor Literacy Corner | 
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Students sit at a table when working with Fine Motor activities. The activities are stored in laundry tubs that are clearly labeled and housed on the white shelving units that hold the book bins - - students carry the tubs to their work area. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my Fine Motor Literacy Corner page. |
| Names Literacy Corner | 
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Students sit at a table when working with Names activities. The activities are stored in laundry tubs that are clearly labeled and housed on the white shelving units that hold the book bins - - students carry the tubs to their work area. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my Names Literacy Corner page. |
| Reading Literacy Corner | 
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Students sit in the reading corner area when working with Reading activities. The materials for the reading corner are stored in book bins (on white shelves surrounding the whole group meeting area, in little baskets that are stored on white shelving in the reading corner center, in a Big Book rack which holds our shared reading charts and big books, and on white shelves that store our class books. Everything is clearly labeled for easy identification. The "I Can..." poster is on the wall and serves as a reminder to students what activities are available at the moment. To view how each activity is stored and organized, visit my Reading Literacy Corner page. |