2014-2015 Classroom

School starts in less than 24 hours and I am ready to go! At least, I think I am. Today I am linking with Swimming into Second Grade to show off my classroom this year. As I mentioned before, I am in the same classroom, though with a different set of desks. It was nice to walk in and already have a few things on the wall or at least know where I wanted them to go. Sticking with my polka dots and sock monkeys was an easy choice. I love them both and already had the decorations! 

The outside of my door. Each year my principal picks a theme that we have to incorporate into our doors. This year it is weather. I love that I was still able to use my sock monkeys! This door stays the same all year, but since I usually keep my door open and against the wall, I am the only one that gets to enjoy it. 

The inside of my door. In theory, each time we read a book we will put it on the door. I haven't decided if it will only be for whole class books or not because I am afraid of opening a Pandora's box with a million umbrellas. Since we don't have bulletin boards in the halls, this door changes for the seasons. Hopefully this door will last me until Christmas!

The view when you walk through the door. I only have sixteen kiddos right now, but last year I had twenty-three, so I am holding my breath to see if I get to keep this delightfully small group. On each desk is a new book, their crayon bag, and the Welcome Back Pack from Sunny Days. 

My Conduct, jobs, objectives, and school-wide engagement posters. Across the school we use the same language in behavior so it is consistent from year to year. Most of my students will be used to this system coming in day one. 

My carpet, word wall, and genre posters. I love to read aloud, so we spend a lot of time here. I mostly use my word wall for math and reading concept cards, which I will hopefully finish soon! The genre posters can be found here. We talk a lot about the genre of the books we read in small group and on the carpet so we can check them off of our genre bingo cards. 

View of my room from the carpet. My lovely shower board only looks clean from this far away! I mostly use my document camera that I was able to get last year through Go Fund Me. My projector will hopefully be installed this year, but currently it lives on a cart that I wheel around. In this picture you can also see the Home Depot bags tied to each chair. Students keep their crayons, scissors, glue, dry erase marker, and sock (for an eraser) in a quart size bag in one pocket and a chapter book in the other pocket. 

Visible thinking wall. I went to Project Zero last spring and was able to incorporate some strategies last year, but I plan on doing more now. 

Anchor chart wall on my other cabinet. My math curriculum has a lot of graphs we will make throughout the year and I love making charts for reading, so this will stay pretty full! 

Small group table and phonics wall. I use SMILA methods, which is an offshoot of Slingerland, to teach and review phonics daily. Once I get another pocket chart, our weekly spelling patterns and rules will go next to my phonogram chart. 

This is the view from desk in the back corner. You can see all of my calendar math up on the front wall. On the right is my station table with crate seats. 

My classroom library! Between Go Fund Me, Scholastic Book Orders, and several expensive trips to the used book store, I have a pretty large library for a second year teacher. All of the basket colors match the school library coding for the different AR levels, which makes picking books easy in both places. Most of my students take 1-4 AR tests a week. 

Panorama view from the door. If only the room was as big as it looks here! I love walking in every morning and am so excited to meet my new class tomorrow!