I put a lot of work into my classroom this year. All of the work is not readily visible in the pictures to follow, though. I moved into a new classroom, and the previous two or three teachers had left the cupboards full of their stuff. The room has abundant storage space, and it was all just full.

I had to wade through stacks of old graded papers, binders of units for classes I don’t teach, dried up markers, and other odds and ends before I could even start to get myself situated. An entire awesome filing cabinet was full of folded up, wrinkled science posters. I went through it all. I either found another teacher who could use it, put it in the school’s storage room, or threw it out. That alone took an entire day.

Here is the entrance to my classroom:

The reading life door was one idea that my principal loved. A few other teachers have commented that they like it, too. So far, I’m the only one with my door decorated, but we’ll see how long that lasts.

I couldn’t do as much to build student-centered learning spaces as I would like. There are expectations at my school that students will sit at desks in rows. I have done a horseshoe before, and seating in pairs, but my principal specifically suggested at the end of last school year that I stick to straight rows. I think it’s a good idea to heed her suggestion for the beginning of the year, at least.

 

I tried not to put too many posters in the front of the classroom. I don’t want to distract from content. During the first week, though, each of my classes is going to do some different collaborative activities to create classroom community guidelines. Those will go on a poster to the left of the whiteboard when they are done.

I decided to do a word wall for each class this year:

I went with light blue and brown for my classroom colors. Those are our school colors, but that was actually unintentional. I did some research into color before making a decision. The light blue is meant to have sort of a calming effect, I hope, and the brown should be very warm and comforting. I hope these colors help make my classroom a calm, comfortable place to be.

Also, as you can see, I still need more books for my classroom library. I’m going to a book sale next Sunday, so hopefully I can pick up some more cheap books then.

Here’s more of my classroom library:

 

I also have another small bookshelf in the back in my “history corner” with the history and historical fiction books. Another teacher called me an overachiever for arranging my books by genre. I just smiled.

Here’s the rest of that wall:

The back wall is set up to display student work as they create it:

The only wall that really has a lot of posters is the one by the windows. I figure there won’t be too much glare that way, and I tried to pick just a few key posters.

 

There are still some more changes coming in the future. I want to get some floor lamps to minimize the need for the overhead lights. I’ll also rearrange the desks after a couple of weeks to foster more conversation and collaboration.

Otherwise, that’s it for my classroom home this year. I hope we have a great year in there!