Home {away from} Sweet Home

I've had two weeks away from my "2nd home" and this morning I was actually looking forward to getting back into the classroom!

I have spent 4 years in this classroom.  Two years were spent as a Pre-K teacher and the classroom looked very different.  Our school had not yet been renovated so one wall (below) was actually a moveable wall that connected my room to the one next door.  Now I have my cubbies along this wall and a huge bulletin board above.  It's not the most practical place for a bulletin board, but I try to make it useful with our Class Expectations, Anchor Charts, and Goals that we refer to all year long (that way I rarely have to get up on top of the cubbies and change the board).  

On top of the cubbies, I have my classroom library. This is the first year that I've done this, and it's actually worked very well.  I have my teaching books (mentor texts, read-alouds, and guided reading books) on the very top, and then leveled books and category books (sorted by author, genre, or topic) in the top part of each cubby.  In the past I have used a bookshelf to store all of these books, but I actually find I can keep a lot more in the classroom this way. I still rotate out the category books depending on our theme and we take down the leveled books once a week when the kiddos book shop, but everything is always easily accessible which I love.

Going around the room to the right, the next thing is my math shelf (right).  I have had this shelf (or a version of it) every year I have taught and I wouldn't know what to do without it; it stores so much.  This year, I have all of my math manipulatives in clear, labeled boxes.  This makes it very easy for the kiddos to take out any materials they need for games or activities.  In addition, I keep table boxes on top of the shelf.  The table boxes store the games and materials for each table that we are using currently.  I refill these as needed throughout the week.


Continuing around the room, is my kidney table, math wall, SMART Board, and then white board.  I leave half of the white board empty for current Anchor Charts or teaching during the day. The second half of the bulletin board (below) has our Morning Meeting materials: calendar, days of school counter, and schedule. I also have a countdown timer clock which we use constantly throughout the day to time lessons, independent work time, and activities.  Below the bulletin board, I have pocket charts with our Class Helper Jobs.

To the right of the white board is my writing shelf.  I also love this shelf for all that it holds.  On the top are bins for our current writing paper options (which change with each unit), below are various writing materials (clipboards, letter stamps and magnets, white boards), and at the bottom are our Literacy Work Station bins (Learn how our Literacy Work Station are organize here).  

Finally, next to the door I have a shelf with additional writing and craft materials.  On top of the shelf are the colored pencils we use for Writers' Workshop, plus some stuffed animals from different colleges (even though you can't see that in the picture).  The colored art caddies on the top two shelves have scissors, glue, and colored pencils which we pull out for Word Study and other times.  Below them I have bins of additional arts and science materials.