Transforming an older classroom into a bright, organized, and comfortable space
Tiny classroom with no window. Sounds like a great idea, right?! I had the opportunity to make a change, so I decided to go for it. I love the 6th grade team of teachers and thought cute little 11-year-olds would be fun to teach. Then I realized what my classroom would look like...
A windowless, little box. After pouring over Pinterest and other blogs, here's some things I did to make it bearable.
Recruit Help
When I inherited the room, it had greige walls and old tile floors. Fortunately, the school was in the process of installing new carpet in our wing. I also bribed my three kids into helping me. I chose a sky blue paint, which my oldest son and younger daughter are painting in the picture.
Since I had no windows, I decided to bring the outdoors in with a wall mural. It was more than I wanted to spend. But if I was going to spend half of my life there, it was worth it to me. I chose a pastoral scene that actually reminded me of the setting for several of our stories.
I've linked the mural on the picture. It was a little tricky to put up, but I read other reviews and had my husband and a 6'4 18-year-old to help. One word of caution...I don't know if it was because I put it over a darker blue wall or just the way the product was made, but you can obviously see the lines from the separate panels. It didn't look too bad from different angles, but it bugged me enough to contact the company. They were wonderful and gave me a complete refund. I have a feeling that if I would have gotten a mural with more color, I wouldn't have had any issue.
It's All About the Lighting
With no natural light, I was warned about getting headaches from other teachers in similar rooms. I covered my fluorescent lights with covers that came attached with magnets to hold them in place. I also hung Edison bulb lights that we had previously used for open houses and outdoor parties and had gotten on super sale at Michaels. I hung all my lights with ceiling hooks from Amazon.
I also hung a couple of lights from Ikea over my reading nook...
...and had a couple of lamps around the room. I filled my small clear one with cap erasers for some color.
With all of the those additions, I kept my overhead lights off especially when doing computer work and the kids loved it.
Cover the Old and Ugly
To brighten up things a little more, I covered a huge bulletin board with light colored fabric and edged it with burlap ribbon. Since I'm a middle-school teacher, I don't have to change my bulletin board often, and fabric stays nice when pulling papers off of it. I love displaying students' projects and having important printouts within easy reach of my students.
*As a side note, I had students for a two-period block, so you will see labels for each class. To hand back papers, each student was assigned a number with a corresponding file folder. It was their responsibility to take papers home. If they didn't, I had a great resource for parent conferences and special ed. teachers until I forced them to take papers after a month. For large projects/papers, I also had students take pictures of their assignment and rubric to add to their ClassDojo portfolio, so parents would have easy access.
Although it might be hard to see, Modge Podge and contact paper are my friends. I covered the back of my ugly brown shelves, my filing cabinets, shelves and tables with various contact paper. I also used Modge Podge to adhere fabric to the front of my drawers. Finally I covered the ugly wires and a printer under my computer stand with a fabric curtain attached with Velcro.
One other awesome tip that I got from Pinterest was to spray my laminated posters with clear matte spray paint to avoid a clear from the lights.
I also covered my chairs and couch with soft gray material. It helped to disguise wear and tear plus could be easily cleaned or replaced when needed.
It's All About the Lighting
Keeping Small Spaces Organized
I don't know if it was because I didn't have a window or it was actually smaller than my old classroom, but this room needed to be efficiently organized for students to have spaces to work.
As shown often on Pinterest, I used three drawer storage bins to store students' Interactive Notebooks, Grammar Notebooks, folders, etc. This helped avoid the constant request to go back to their locker for things.
I tucked more storage behind the door. I was happy to scavenge some unwanted shelves from our library to hold textbooks and workbooks.
Students could also find their handouts for the week. This helped me organize my papers for each day and students could easily find them when they were absent. Extra credit pages were kept there as well as my Pen and Pencil Rental. Students could borrow utensils but had to write their name on the white board. It was an easy reminder to help them return the pen or have other students find them after the period:)
Students could keep extra supplies and their phones (if they had a digital book) in my shoe hanger with labeled numbers. Passes could also be found next to the door, attached to desk carrel, lovingly referred to as Isolation Island. If students needed less distraction or just needed to get away from their peers, they could request to sit there for the period. It also had a comfy, rolling desk chair which made it even more of a favorite spot.
Finishing Touches
I usually started the year by doing a project related to Dr. Seuss's All the Places You'll Go. So I had reminders of this throughout the room. I found the sign above my door at Hobby Lobby.
I used the butterfly on all my logos and to decorate the walls because we also begin the year looking at this quote...
My teacher's desk space also gave students an insight into my hobbies and passions. I love vintage decor as well as traveling. I hung prints and pendants from some of my favorite places. I am also the boys cross country coach so hanging some medals from a few of my races gave me some running credibility:)
My Promethean Board dominated the front of the room, but I was happy that I had chalkboard space on either side of it. On the left, I would write what we were doing for the day and the objectives. On the right, the homework was assigned. I used signs from Hobby Lobby to differentiate. I also glued magnets to calendar numbers to designate work by the class period. For regular assignments, I printed them, laminated them, and also put magnets on the back so that I didn't have to write the same book title or topic repeatedly.
First Impressions
Finally, as students entered my classroom for the year, they were greeted with this door decoration. I bought the printout from TeachersPayTeachers and laminated it.
My door was chalk painted so I could frequently change it to fit the seasons or even to go with some of our unit themes (such as a body outline and caution tape for Westing Game).
For the door window, I sewed two pieces of fabric together on a wood dowel. I then tied it up with a ribbon. It worked great for Lock-Out drills or if privacy was needed.