Good morning sweet teacher and non-teacher friends! I thought I would post some pics of my classroom at the beginning of last school year and then you'll be able to see the differences when I set up for 2017-18. I am transitioning my theme from owls to pineapples. I just LOVE what pineapples symbolize - hospitality. Our classroom motto will be "Stand Tall. Wear a Crown. Be sweet on the Inside." What great character traits for an elementary classroom! These go along GREAT with our School Wide PBIS system as well. Be Safe. Be Respectful. Be Responsible. I always want students, parents, and visitors to our room to feel welcome and comfortable. I also want to be comfortable in my home away from home. Let's face it. We spend most of our waking hours during the school year in our classrooms and they have to be a pleasant place to spend our time or it's not a very nice place to be. So...here are some pics from LAST year's (2016-17) tour...
This is my cubby area where the students keep their things.
Also shown is my Guided Reading cart that holds all
of my leveled books. I may need to change this for next
year because word on the street has it that we are
going to be getting ALL NEW leveled libraries for
each of our 1st Grade classrooms in the fall!!!
I cannot tell you how excited I am at this
prospect. We have been looking forward to this for
10 years, my friends! I am thinking I may get another
cubeicals unit with fabric bins to hold all of my
awesome reading goodies! Then the leveled cart
could hold centers or math stations! I'll let you know
how things turn out later this summer!
This is the view from my classroom door After a few
weeks of school the students and I collectively
decided that we didn't want a class set of
desks anymore. I have alternative seating in my
room (bath mats, bean bags, and cushions) so
I now only have 8 student desks and 1 for a thinking
spot in case a student needs to be away to collect
themselves before returning back to the group.
Look how HUGE my room looks without all of the desks!
This is my classroom library. On the sides are color-coded
differentiated literacy center drawers. Each student is assigned
a color group that is leveled to their ability. They choose
activities from these drawers during literacy time.
Students have no idea that they are ability leveled.
They just know they are in color groups. This makes it
SO easy for me to make sure each student is
working on skills they need to practice! Thanks
to Mr. Greg from The Kindergarten Smorgasboard
for this WONDERFUL idea! You can also see the center wheel
in the upper left on the yellow bulletin board. I turn the wheel each
day, so that each group can choose from different activities
each day Monday-Thursday.
Check out Mr. Greg's center info. here: The Kindergarten Smorgasboard
This are our book boxes. Each student has a box
with their student number. I used to label them EVERY
school year with student names, but that got very
tedious and I was constantly having to buy
new labels and either pull of the old labels
or stack them on top of the old. This
worked SO much better. It also allowed
them to learn their student numbers VERY
quickly and they could label their papers
so they were in ABC order for me, making
it easier for grading and passion papers back
in their cubbies.
On top, I have my treasure chest (students pick when they
have filled a homework card - they only had spelling
homework, so I punched their cards when they turned
in ANY work done). I also have my STAR jar,
which is a reward system. They earn STARS for
exhibiting stellar behavior. After the jar is filled, they
get to choose a reward party. Next to that is my
owl jewelry box for box tops. Then, our Germ Juice
in case we don't get a chance to wash hands
right before heading to lunch. Finally, our
Boo Boo Bucket to hold band aids.
A view of our room from the Board wall.
Another room view from the Board wall.
The view from the back of our classroom.
Our meeting place. The polka dot step was made
by my wonderful hubby and painted by
me and my awesome daughter. The white
shelves to either side hold our Foundations tubs
for phonics instruction. The laundry basket holds our
bath mats for working around the room. The owl bin
to the left of the step holds my read aloud.
The clear tub to the right of the polka dot step
holds all of our clipboards.
The things to the right are my Monday-Friday
drawers which hold ALL of my teaching
materials for each week (copies, TE's,
manipulatives, and any other supplies
we need for lessons). To the right of that
is my supply bin storage unit. This holds glue,
glue sticks, scrap paper, paint palettes, dry
erase boards, dry erase markers, dry erase
erasers, extra scissors, tissues, and pencils.
This is my teacher area and read aloud chair, complete
with cute owl pillow. The little shelf displays the books
for that month that I want to be sure to read
that are themed to what we are learning about or
are holiday related for that month.
This is my Center Wheel that is pictured in a picture above
in my classroom library shot. The students have 2 choices
each day on their color of the pie, and within those 2 choices
are other choices in that particular area.
These are our Turn In Bins, located right inside our door.
Students are to put any money or notes to me in the left
bin, and then work goes in the right bin.
These are our homework cards. I punch a picture
on the card to correspond with how many pages
of work was turned in, either through spelling
homework or center/classwork for the day.
After the card if filled, the student can choose
something out of the treasure chest.
This is our menu and attendance station.
Students move their name card up to the "hot"
or "cold" lunch graph and then I can take attendance
and lunch count each morning. The yellow paper
is our monthly menu, which I cross off after lunch each day.
To the right is my weekly newsletter. I send these home
on Friday for the following week so parents and students
can see what is coming up!
Next year some things will stay pretty much the same and
some things will be revamped. I always like to change up
something in my room each year to keep it fresh.
I also always add some organizational thing or things
each school year. This year it was the fabric bins
you can see to the right of my desk and behind on the
counter. I have a total of 6 bins and they hold
different things. One has all of my writing
picture books and examples of craftivities that
go with projects. One holds teacher supplies.N
One holds files. Some of them became a hodgepodge as
I didn't know where to put things as they came in so they
just ended up in there! As I set up this coming year,
I will be going though each bin and reorganizing so
I'm ready to go for 2017-18!
Stay tuned for updates to my classroom.....
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