Classroom Tour Before and After

I am out on maternity leave until the end of October. My plan was to get in and set up the room and get out! We all loaded up and headed to the school. We even convinced Andy, my dad, to go! This is what greeted us!

After about five short hours....we were finished for the day. With Andy there to move furniture and Kim there to organize and keep people moving we got it all done!

So what is all that? Well most of it is literacy centers and stations. The biggest part of my room is the carpet area. I order foam mats about every other year and I LOVE THEM! I am convinced that there is nothing better. Each child has their own square and their own space on the carpet. It is worth every penny for my sanity!

Here is my center chart on the left, before I added any of the pictures. On the right are the center buckets that house activities that my students complete before they can make a center choice. We call the things on the left "can dos" and the buckets on the right "have tos." You can see a post by Kim {here} that explains the way we do our centers a little better.

I believe in students always having access to books! Here are the five reading areas in my room. I have them divided by fiction, non fiction, unit books, big books, and miscellaneous. You can read more about our class library in this blog post: Classroom Library

 

Here are some of my abc and phonics centers: stamps, abc toys, playdough, magnetic letters, and pocket chart. My kids love Deedee Wills' Stamping Words Fun and use it all the time in the stamp center. 

Here are a few of my writing centers: write the room, overhead, and mail center. We also love Deedee Wills' Overhead Stations. Check out her first one {here}.

 Here are a few other centers: read the room, puzzles, music books, and sound books. Kim has a TON of music books. That is the favorite center in my room. It is so quick and easy! Here are a few of my favorites:

Jack Hartmann Music Books

Shari Sloane's School is Cool Music Books

 Shari Sloane's Get Ready Music Books

 And now for a tour of my wall space...Here is where I do calendar. I also keep up with our current vocabulary word on the right hand side. See how I do vocabulary {here}. I make my kids accountable and require that they follow along by filling in their own calendar. Check out Kim's post about the calendar notebook {here}. You can also find it on TPT {here}.

 Here is where I post my anchor charts and standards. I love Deanna Jump's I can statements. My whole team bought them and uses them! Check them out {here}.

 On the left is my environmental print word wall. On the top right is my name word wall and on the bottom right is my main word wall where I put all my sight words as I introduce them.

 Here are my color words and number words.

 Here is my birthday caravan.

 One of my favorite things about my classroom is the bathroom! I share a bathroom with the teacher next door. I have a policy in place...if the hallway door is propped open then you may go, when it is closed nobody goes.

I hope you enjoyed the tour of my room!