Teaching sight words to new readers is vital to their literacy success when learning to read. Sight words are those words that come up repeatedly and may or may not follow the typically phonics rules. Many teachers like to send home sight word flash cards for students and parents to practice regularly outside of school […]
Classroom DIY
Classroom decor ideas for all classroom teachers. Includes ideas for storage, managing mailboxes, easy center stations, word walls, organized desks, and more! Have fun exploring!
Making Some Classroom Mailboxes!
I don’t know about your classroom supply budget, but mine never seemed to take me far after I bought teacher supply necessities like copy paper, pencils, and chart paper. I LOVE the usefulness of student mailboxes, but paper sorter/organizers that can be used for classroom mailboxes can run around $100 for 12 slots (and that […]
Spin a Surprise {Classroom Management}
Learning about classroom management techniques in teacher education classes sound easy enough: make sure you have established rules, you are making eye contact with your students, and calling home if the student continues to act out beyond what is expected. But sometimes you just need a little extra in the way of strategies. I don’t […]
Having A Ball With Vocabulary – DIY Style
Teaching vocabulary is super important for background knowledge and understanding context clues within new reading passages, math story problems, and other nonfiction subject area resources, like geography and science. Finding teaching techniques that work fast and effectively to broaden all different types of vocabulary lists can feel daunting at times. When students show up on […]
Pocket Chart Make-Over
Pocket chart stands are almost a necessity in an elementary classroom. They can be used for so many different activities in daily lessons and offer a permanent home for those items, like anchor charts, you know you’ll want to review again with students. I know for me, I have always used an easel or chart […]
Custom Teacher Desk Organizers
Teacher desk decor can range from super cute and personalized to nonexistent. There are few places that students don’t have access to and those are your chance to make your space feel more like your home away from home. You can decorate and organize classroom bookcases and even your computer teacher desktop. If your classroom […]
Make Your Own {No Sew} Chair Pockets!
Chair pockets are a perfect way to get extra storage in the classroom. Even if you are not crafty (like me), you can still make these classroom DIY projects for your classroom pretty cheap. There are lots of ways to sew chair covers, including using pillowcases, book covers, or using your favorite fabric and a […]
DIY Dry Erase Boards!
Having a solution for creating your own portable DIY dry erase boards is easy and fun! Of course, you could buy a set of white boards. Or go to Home Depot or another home improvement store and have them cut you shower board into smaller pieces to use. Or perhaps you prefer to use […]
12 Days of Gratitude Jar!
Hey teaching friends! I know most of us tend to think about the 12 Days of Christmas when December hits, but I was reflecting on being thankful in November, so I decided to throw a little Organized Classroom twist on the normal tradition. Introducing the 12 Days of Gratitude Jar! November is a tough month […]
Make a Custom Desk Organizer!
Do you have desk drawers that are so scary, you can never find what you are looking for in the massive piles of supplies? If everything in your desk drawer is loose and at first glance, you have push pins, pens, coins, gum, and paper clips all floating around aimlessly in the drawer, you need […]
Concealing the Clutter
Does a cluttered classroom make your head hurt? Or do you just accept it as inevitable and go with the flow? The classroom environment does play an important role in student learning, but with budgets that are small (or more likely nonexistent), it is tough to get rid of anything. With that said, the visual […]
Make Your Own Table Top Pocket Chart
Hey teaching friends! I don’t know about you, but I am a serious pocket chart junkie! I have just about every size and color they make. They have been used for behavior, daily schedules, calendars, vocabulary, centers, and more. BUT – the one issue I have with pocket charts is that (at least in my […]
Visual Supply Organization
What are your favorite organizational tools in the classroom? I have to be honest when I tell you that plastic containers with lids are my number 1. With all the different classroom DIY tutorials out there, you can make virtually anything into a storage container, but I never seem to stray too far away from […]
Make Your Own Bulletin Board Lettering Tutorial!
Hey teaching friends! I haven’t done a video for y’all in a while, so I thought it was about time. I posted my newest Interactive Bulletin Board: Flower Power Figurative Word Play for grades 4 and 5 {picture below}, and as I was creating the bulletin board lettering, it dawned on me how much easier […]
Setting Up Your Student Data Binders
I know data binders are really in right now, and I have always found them to be a great student motivator. Since they are personalized for the child, you can really sit with each student to discuss what he or she excels in – and which that he or she could be working on. Perfect […]
Serving Up Place Value with Straws
Teaching place value is certainly a building block of math instruction and using items such as place value charts, simple manipulatives, and printables can help to create a deeper understanding so that when decimals are introduced in later grades, students can easily add their prior knowledge. What is place value and how do you teach […]
40 Ways to Store Teacher Supplies
Knowing multiple ways to store teacher supplies will assist you when you are forced to move to a different classroom. Some rooms are small, have closets, no closet, some wall space, zero wall space, too many student desks, an oversized teacher desk – or as in my case: pipes from the urinals from when it […]
Organize Your Weekly Lesson Plans!
When I did the post about Curriculum Mapping, Betsy K. asked in the comments about what my lesson planning crate was and how to organize lesson plans, so I thought maybe I would throw together a quick post to explain! Knowing how to organize your lesson plans and lesson plan book in your elementary classroom makes […]
The Teacher’s Ultimate Guide to Printing on Sticky Notes
Custom sticky notes in the classroom? That might sound difficult to pull off. What could you even use them for? It might even sound expensive. Believe it or not, there are way more uses for them in your classroom than you might think! You can use on windows for brain dump sticky note thinking, student […]
Fact Family Funhouse
Teaching a fact family lesson is one of my favorite topics! I love watching students light up when they realize how they can easily figure out how to subtract without using fingers. Like any other math concept for young students, you will want to start by using concrete models and then eventually moving to […]