Messy Desks?

As a teacher, we may ask, "Who keeps changing all of my clocks because there is never enough time?" to "Why do the monsters visit every night and eat all of my pencils and construction paper?"to "How am I missing this daily earthquake that moves all of my desks in my classroom?!"

BUT, the good thing is...is that there are many things we teachers do understand! and why am I so happy for this post, well because I believe I have solved the mystery of my student's desks.

That is, how to keep their desks nice, clean, and organized!!

 Watch the makeover...

Which takes this:

  

And turns it into this:

 

What is the magic behind this wonderful beauty of a view?! The plastic containers that you can easily find in bulk at your local $ store!! I had seen other pictures before using the Sterilite drawers but with needing 24 and at a current price of 1.96 along with the hunt to find 24, all after visiting 1000  many stores, I racked my brain trying to come up with something that may be a bit easier...and it just so happens that these plastic bins fit like a DREAM!!! AND--they are a taller and longer than the Sterilite drawers let alone cheaper and who can't save a pretty penny or two these days!! Plus, when you get that new student or one happens to break etc. you have a go-to plan--the $ store which almost always has a gazillion!

What my kids love about these and most importantly take pride in...is that this solution has helped to turn their desk into a "Big Kid desk" with these containers AWESOME DRAWERS!!! They can slide them out and back in and all of the pencils, crayons, etc. have a place. They are working wonderfully and I placed a label with their number on each container so that they can be reused!

Are you wondering what is stored in these fantastic drawers?

No worries, I got you covered! In their drawers they have:

 -their own personal pencil bags (we also have community supplies for each group which are located on the 2-tier crate shelf that can slightly be seen in one of the pictures above)

-an AEIOU strip (laminated piece of paper with the vowels) that we use for daily short- and long-vowel practice (I.e. I state the word "cat" and they would have to cover the "a" with a math cube (or you could use a clothespin)

-a Tupperware with their number on the lid and the bowl itself (I got these in a pack of 6 for less than $2.00 at WM) and we use these for storing their PBIS tickets and POGS (another incentive our school has adopted this year). This came about because the endless sandwich bags began to get a bit out of hand and these are durable and wonderful!!

-A gallon Ziploc bag (Eventually, I plan to get some other way of storing but...) this is known as their "Word Bag" each week we have new High Frequency Words and with my weekly independent work. My students use these words to complete their work and they are then stored in this bag to practice and review with. We also store our little bag of Digit Cards that we use for many different math activities during our math time.

AND, saving the BEST for last!

 

Don't ask me how, but for some reason if I stay in a $ store for enough time, my brain begins to think of these insane and crazy ways to turn items into tools for our classroom!! With Easter eggs already being out, the large ones gave me an idea..I recently turned my clipboards into chalkboards to help save money on the dry-erase markers that created endless problems and this my friends is how we...

 

store our chalk and eraser (a piece of felt) and YES a whole piece of chalk fits perfectly in these larger Easter eggs! Hip hop hooray for the Easter eggs!!!

In all, I hope that at least one of these examples/pictures helped to give you  some ideas as to how you can solve the "messy desks" of your classroom! Happy organizing! Until next time! :)