First Grade Is A Hoot : August 2014

Back To School Part 2

Because my classroom is small, and the classroom next to mine happens to be empty this year, I decided to use that room as a reading lab room. My students are going to be able to go to this room once a day during reading groups and get to work on workstations. Unfortunately, that meant another room I had to organize and decorate. But as I stated in my previous post, I have a large amount of classroom decor, so I think my workstation room turned out to be cute. It still needs some items here and there, but I haven't decided what to use in all of the blank spaces. My students are going to be so excited to use this room! I am excited too, because now we won't be on top of each other in the classroom during guided reading.

Bulletin Board for Guided Reading Room:

Before

In all fairness, the boxes, bins, and carts were not just lying haphazardly in this room for a year. I moved items I was not going to use in my classroom into this room while decorating my classroom; so I could use it in the reading lab. This room was more of a storage room with tables, desks, chairs, and guided reading books.

After:

Guided Reading Table

Thankfully, I found a kidney shaped table to use instead of this long table. All it needs now are dry erase circles and the guided reading area is set!

Language Workstation:

Spelling/Sort Workstation:

Science/Discovery Workstation:

Writing Workstation

Reading/Listening Workstation:

My students will go to one workstation area a day. Each workstation will have multiple activities for the students to complete, so that if they finish one activity early, they will be able to work on another activity until they are called to their guided reading group. The workstation activities will also change out weekly.

I am so excited for my students to use this room! They are going to love it!

Back To School!

It's hard to believe that summer is over and a new school year is about to begin! This time of year I am full of anxiety and excitement for the new school year. I have so many new and exciting activities planned this year, and I cannot wait to have my students in my classroom so that we can get busy learning!

But before we can get busy learning, I have been busy decorating and organizing my classroom and my workstation room for the upcoming year. It always amazes me just how much teaching materials I have accumulated in only three years, but I swear I do use most if not all of it! But all of that stuff makes for some long hard work days, but it is definitely worth it in the end.

My classroom is extremely small and unusually long, which makes it difficult to decide how to set up the classroom. I think I have everything exactly where it needs to be, so that every space is conducive for learning. Here are some before and after pics of my classroom.

Before

This is a view of what my classroom looked like after walking back into it after a long summer. We had to remove everything from the walls so that the rooms could be repainted. We also had to put things neatly into the center of the room, so they could clean our carpets. Unfortunately, things were put back as neatly as I had them piled up.

After

Walking into a clean classroom is like breathing in fresh air for me! I have been told that I am way too OCD to teach, but it works for me and my students!

Student Drop Off Station

I believe in keeping students accountable in the classroom. Each morning, the students walk right by the drop off station in the classroom to put their owl on the tree if they are present that day, choose a pencil from the ready to write cup, look to see if they are the helper for the day, and drop off their daily folder. This routine helps the students to come in quickly, so that they are able to go straight to their desk to get started on their morning work.

Front of the Classroom