Let's Take a Little Tour

Today was the first day of school.  It was awesome.  I love love love the first day of school.  (No sarcasm here, I seriously love it.  It's second to Christmas in my life.)  Let's take a tour of my room, shall we?

The obligatory before shot:


Should have taken a middle of the room getting ready shot.  You know the one, where you take everything out of the cabinet, start organizing it, start another project, leave for the day, come back the next day with twelve bags from Walmart?  Yea, should have taken one of those.

Morning of the first day of school, view from the door:


Another view from the front corner.  Can you spy my teacher toolbox?:

**Yes the posters over my computer are too small for that space and too high.  That's where the VOICES board was until the day before school.  I had to hurry up and fill it with something!  It'll get fixed up.  Eventually.

Um, remember the VOICES board that I remade? Remade it again. Sigh. I made it bigger. Then, I found this pin on Pinterest and decide to make it even better.


You can be sure I will be digging through this website plenty.  This actual bulletin board was on the other side of my room where the computers were.  My district's super nice maintenance men moved it Friday to somewhere I could actually reach, and the kids could see while I taught.



My CRAFT board.  This is the world's comfiest chair by the way.  It was a glider my own parents bought for their house when my first daughter was born.


Somehow I did not get pictures of my classroom library??? Pretty plain Jane compared to a lot of them out there, but it makes me happy. I print the labels on 2x4 shipping labels and stick then on the coordinating AR color.

My teacher desk area with my small group table.  Obviously a big fan of the Ikea Flyt magazine boxes. Heard a blog rumor they are being discontinued???? Say it isn't so!




My future focus board.



Homework board and bathroom chart/job chart area.  You can see the top shelves of my library in the next two pictures, too.





Indoor recess stuff.  I have a poster with our rules.  The baskets have Webkinz, Legos, and free draw supplies.  They can play games, too.


Front of the room.  Have I mentioned how much I loooooooooove my Mimio?


And there you have it. I hope you enjoyed peeking into my classroom. I'm linking up:



Now for the word of caution.  I made a lot of cute stuff for my classroom this year (if I do say so myself).  However, remember this makeover?

I love it.  But it doesn't make my laundry any cleaner than before.  Same with my classroom.  I think it's easy to get caught up in all the cute, fun ideas we see on Pinterest and other blogs.  I honestly don't think my family cares that our laundry room looks a million times better.  It makes me feel calmer when I walk in the room and walk past it a million times a day, but the laundry is still getting done the same way.  It's the same with our classrooms.  Having my room this way makes me feel calmer when a million bazillion things are happening at once.  But if it doesn't do it for you, don't bother doing it.  One of my daughter's most awesome teachers frequently looked like a bomb had gone off in her room.  She was an amazing teacher.  There's not correlation between cute rooms and awesome teaching.  So, not a cutsie pootsie teacher?  Don't sweat it.  Just keep on keepin' on with that incredible teaching you do.

Okay, off my soap box.  Have a great school year!