This year I have a great bunch of Year 4s. It has been lovely coming from Year 1, these guys can get started on work right away and don't have to be taught every.single.little.thing! I do miss the enthusiasm and excitement that the firsties show though.
Anyway, with my new year level, I have a new classroom. I haven't taken many photos, but here are some to show the general layout. Since I'm with older kids, I tried to reduce the 'stuff' and keep it very simple. I'm backing everything on black this year, so it isn't as bright as my past rooms. No poms this year either... but if I can find a place they wont' be chewed up by the fans, I might just add some soon :)
This was taken before school started but shows the basic layout. I have five groups of six desks. Behind the groups I have our small group area, an office (that I've made into a small group area for aides to work in) and the entry to our computer lab. I'm lucky enough to have enough computers for half the class to share with my teaching partner in a computer lab connected to our rooms.
This is the front of the room as it looks now. I have my desk here, since I need my laptop to connect to the interactive whiteboard. I felt a bit funny having my desk here but the alternative was a little moon table which I know from experience isn't big enough. It hasn't been too bad though, I keep a stool here and can pull individual students to conference with and can type up my notes straight away on the laptop, which I prefer over writing.
Over the holidays I went through all the boxes in my garage and found books to use this year (I've also kept some of the chapter books from last year in first for my lower readers). I'm loving my new labels :)
I also love the supply labels I bought from Maria Manore. I've gotten rid of a lot of the polka dots I've used the past few years, but couldn't pass up the pretty little dots on these!
Nor could I pass up these gorgeous parts of speech posters by Ladybugs Teacher Files.
I made a new alphabet for this year too. You can download it here. It only comes with Queensland red and blue lines.
This photo is near the front side of the room. I keep my big book holder thing here since I need to leave room for those two big doors to open. I have storage shelves in there.
I downloaded the SMART goals from What I Have Learned on TpT. I ended up typing up my own since there wasn't an included template for Math Facts (which is what we made our goals on). Then I realised there was an editable version.... doh!
This is one of the goals. In the arrow, the kids come up with all the ways they could work towards their goal. Down the bottom, they decide on which of those activities they will focus on. We talked about how we learn best, so some kids chose listening to times table songs, others putting up flash cards around their house, writing out booklets, chanting them or playing games with decks of cards or dice etc. The iPhone selfies activity is by Art with Jenny K. The kids loved it!
Instead of having jobs that I change out weekly, the kids are in a student committee which is responsible for a range of jobs for the WHOLE TERM. I have another post all about it if you want to read more. You can download the posters for free in my TpT store.
I've also started using my Voices board which I use to set writing goals. I also use part of my front board to set up our weekly goals.
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