Classroom rearranging addiction
What starts out as a quick weekend run by the daycare to drop off a Goodwill find or some discarded toy from my kid's toy box leads to a 2-hour marathon of cleaning my room and re-arranging (again) my furniture.
In a preschool classroom, you have these ideas about how things are going to work. You arrange your room and it looks great. You can't wait for the littles to come in and try it all out. And very soon you realize that your plan has gone awry. There is a reason why furniture must be placed a certain way, and why quiet centers and noisy centers can't be neighbors. So you observe and make mental notes; then you come in and arrange again. And again. Someone please tell me that this stage shall pass. It's not that I don't enjoy being there in my room, in the quiet, reflecting, planning, thinking. It's just I want my room to be DONE. And to function really well.
My main challenge is that my room is very long and narrow and the loft (although I love it), darkens the whole corner of the room and I am a "let the light in" kind of gal. I also have to have seven centers set up at all times. I have no problem setting up seven centers but they do take up a lot of space. And trying to place the centers according to guidelines can be tricky, especially with large, chunky, preschool furniture. I also long for a desk, but there is not one ounce of space to squeeze one into, so I use my cabinet for all my personal storage and the children's table becomes my desk each day during naptime.
Public school teachers have the advantage of being able to paint, decorate, clean, and arrange over summer break, whereas daycare is almost always in session. So it's tricky to fit in long projects or do a major overhaul. My director, her husband, myself, and my husband (with help from some other volunteers) recently painted the room over a 3-day weekend. They stayed to finish and put the furniture back, literally, at the last minute the night before school was back in session. That was close!
Well, here are more photos of the smaller rearranging I did this weekend:
In a preschool classroom, you have these ideas about how things are going to work. You arrange your room and it looks great. You can't wait for the littles to come in and try it all out. And very soon you realize that your plan has gone awry. There is a reason why furniture must be placed a certain way, and why quiet centers and noisy centers can't be neighbors. So you observe and make mental notes; then you come in and arrange again. And again. Someone please tell me that this stage shall pass. It's not that I don't enjoy being there in my room, in the quiet, reflecting, planning, thinking. It's just I want my room to be DONE. And to function really well.
My main challenge is that my room is very long and narrow and the loft (although I love it), darkens the whole corner of the room and I am a "let the light in" kind of gal. I also have to have seven centers set up at all times. I have no problem setting up seven centers but they do take up a lot of space. And trying to place the centers according to guidelines can be tricky, especially with large, chunky, preschool furniture. I also long for a desk, but there is not one ounce of space to squeeze one into, so I use my cabinet for all my personal storage and the children's table becomes my desk each day during naptime.
Public school teachers have the advantage of being able to paint, decorate, clean, and arrange over summer break, whereas daycare is almost always in session. So it's tricky to fit in long projects or do a major overhaul. My director, her husband, myself, and my husband (with help from some other volunteers) recently painted the room over a 3-day weekend. They stayed to finish and put the furniture back, literally, at the last minute the night before school was back in session. That was close!
Well, here are more photos of the smaller rearranging I did this weekend:
Added new chart rack to circle time/meeting area
our classroom song, sung to tune of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
Classroom rules
Sensory area
added some quiet toys to loft
my Goodwill finds this week- watering can for .29 cents, fake strawberries to water, a girl's Pink Leap-pad with case and 4 games (keeping for my kiddo until she tires of it then I will donate to my class), and 20 Big Books (thanks alerting me, Donna M.)
My son gave up his marble maze and I located some dress-up clothes in the daycare closet to add to this center
Our daily schedule
I added the What Time is it Now? pouch with schedule cards to the bottom of our schedule with sticky hooks. The kids like to change them out to see what time of day it is.
Ok, so even the bathroom got some posters
The bathroom door and classroom door were lovingly decorated by my students with help from some Dollar Tree re-positionable wall art I had in my crafting closet.
-Lynn
1 comments:
Hi Lynn,
My name is Marianne and I am currently enrolled in a Master's degree online studying Early Childhood Education. I am a mother of three (ages 16, 14 and 11). I am all new to blogging. In this week's assignment, all students are asked to create a blog of our own and to do some research on other teachers' blogs, focusing on classroom arrangement, structure, organization and methodologies....it is all very intimidating to me but I stumbled upon your page and find it informative. I will see if I can navigate a bit more. If I may ask you, how important do you think classroom arrangement is in the learning of all children? I think it is crucial to have order, structure and a natural ongoing flow in all classrooms to allow children to feel comfortable, happy and well adjusted. Your thoughts are welcomed. Thanks, Marianne
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