Effectively Organizing Student Materials

Hi Sweet Friends!

As I've been finding time to sneak a few hours a week in my classroom, I wanted to share with you some ways I organize my classroom.

I'm also linking up with Elizabeth at Fun in Room 4B and Ladybug's teacher Files for their Optimum Organizational Linky Party.

1. Organizing student supplies

I have struggled for years finding just the right place for my students to keep their supplies.  FINALLY, I found something that works in my classroom.  I have my student desks arranged in 4 tables.  At the end of each table, I have a black shelf that I purchased for about $15.00 from Wal-Mart.  In this shelf, I have plastic shoe boxes for each student in that group.  These shoe boxes contain their markers, scissors, glue, rulers, and etc.   I also have the book boxes in these shelves also.  These store my students reading, math, and writing journals, six minute solution folders, and rocket math folders.   Also notice that the book boxes and shoe boxes are numbered. Each student in my classroom receives a number at the beginning of the year.  This helps me organize papers collected, locker tags, and many other things.

2.  Organizing supplies for student activities

I purchased these colorful caddies from The Dollar Tree.  Each caddy is numbered for each table/group in my classroom.  Each day after school, as I am preparing for the next day, I fill each caddy with items needed for the first subject that my students will need some important materials.  I started using this last year, and LOVE it.  It really helps increase my time spent on instruction rather than that time spend on passing out materials.  When being evaluated by my administrator last year, she even commented on the fact that this was such a great organizing tool to help effectively use instructional time.

Thanks so much for stopping by!  Best of luck to all of you that are beginning to prepare your classroom for the start of a new school year.

Don't forget to check out all of the amazing organizational ideas by clicking on the linky button below.