Classroom Organizing Pics and a New Find

I have been spending a lot of time this week organizing my classroom.  It has been very time consuming.  I moved into the classroom last summer, but didn't get to spend much time on actually organizing.  So here is what I walked into Friday after organizing for a few days.

See!  I made a mess!  I took everything out of the cabinets and I bought smaller shoe box sized containers at Big Lots.  The were only $1 each!

I realized that many of the existing containers were too large to hold what I needed them to hold so I forgot what was in the containers and things didn't get used.

Here is some after pics:

Notice that everything in the cabinet is easy to see and find.  I used my handy little label maker to label the contents of every container.  The great thing about the labels is that they peel off cleanly and easily if I need to use the containers to hold something else.

 

I tried to group the items in the cabinets in a way that made more sense to me.  I put the reading materials and crafts supplies in a cabinet.  The math, science, and social studies supplies are in another cabinet.  I have a cabinet that has paper and large blocks, and then I have this cabinet that contains seasonal items along with extra puzzles and games so I can rotate materials throughout the year.

 

 

I plan to use clear labels to label the outside of the cabinets with general categories so I can locate items easily.  I hope to start doing that on Monday.  Here is a look at the room when I decided it was time to quit for the day.

See!  It's not as bad.

I spent some time organizing the materials on this side of the large shelf too.

I still need to take the cover off of my computers and the brown paper off the bulletin boards, but I have faith that I will finish soon.  On another note, I had the idea of getting aprons for my aide and myself to wear when the kiddos are painting.  I have ruined so many shirts through the years on painting days.  I happen to find these vinyl aprons at Big Lots for $6.  They are perfect!

The true test will come when I break out the paints!  If you missed my post earlier, I am having a 20% off sale at both my Teachers Pay Teachers and Teachers Notebook stores.  Just click the store widgets on the right hand side of my blog and it will take you to my store.  Happy shopping!