I seriously cannot believe it is time to head back to school tomorrow! The good news is that my classroom is all set up and ready to go. This year was SO much easier compared to last year. It is amazing the difference a year makes. I feel like I spent most of last year getting down my own personal routines and finding the perfect spot for things. At first I had so many things spread out and eventually everything found a "home" that was more useful. I believe I blogged a bit last year about organization and boy did it help. I spent most of the summer on Pinterest. I am more than slightly obsessed to say the least. This year my classroom is Pinterest based. It has been so wonderful to virtually peek into classrooms and see how other teachers do things. This year in my room the good things stayed and I improved (or tried to) others. Here's a little peek into my classroom :-)
The "Smart Cookies" board is the same as last year. You can find better pics in my organization post. It is my "What can I do, I'm all through" board where I put worksheets and activities that can be completed once they are done with their classwork. My Twitter/Facebook (I haven't decided what it is based on) board is new for this year. Throughout the year I will post questions for students to answer. I laminated the word bubble cards from Walmart (88 cents!) so they are dry erase. On the left is a section for birthdays and the blank spot on the bottom will be the lunch menu. The blue oval to the left is a "no name" paper holder that is conveniently above the recycle bin. I've decided this year that I am NOT hunting down the owners of no name papers and after they are up for a few days in the recycle bin they will go. After that they will just have to do it over. My thought is that after re-doing work so many times names will be put on papers! In September we are supposed to be getting tables, hip-hip-hooray! Bye bye desks, I cannot wait to see you gone :-)
This bowl is on my bookshelf, I think you can barely make it out in the last picture. I decided this year to really try to reward positive behavior so I am trying a ticket system. Students can earn tickets for good behavior and they go in the bowl. I plan to pull 5 tickets each Friday for my reward earners. Rewards this year are coming in the form of coupons that I found on, you guessed it, Pinterest! They are everything from homework passes, lunch passes, stinky feet passes (no shoes) and basically other things that cost me nothing.
Luckily from my summer job I had a million plastic containers like you get out of candy/toy machines so that is what they went in.
I managed to bum the bookshelf from another teacher who no longer had use for it and I am working on turning it into my math game station. The small bags will hold card games and the bottom will be other file folder games. Around my window I added some signs from http://www.technologyrocksseriously.com The website is AMAZING and I wish I had room for each and every one of them. My TV cart also houses my inside recess goodies. Seeing this picture reminds me that I have yet to go through it to see what's left. Let's just hope it doesn't rain tomorrow and we don't need to use it. My clip chart I also talked about in a previous blog and is now set up for both classes.
I finally made curtains for my windows. Once they were up and suspended by fishing line I realized one panel was put on backwards so the pattern is wrong. It is not worth the hassle to take it all down and switch it. I am pretty happy with them for the 15 dollars worth of fabric and 10 minutes worth of sewing they took.
OH OH OHHHHH! I almost forgot to tell you about my amazing FREEBIE! Our school bought us electric pencil sharpeners that are AMAZING and soooo QUIET. It doesn't take much to make me happy. Haha.
One last thing... I updated my mailboxes to make them more fun and colorful.
To everyone else who is about to or has started the 2012-2013 school year I wish you the best!
Ms. J
