2nd Grade Classroom Tour – Setting Up a Brand New Classroom

Have you ever moved into a brand-new classroom? I had that opportunity after moving rooms three times in about 18 months. Here is a tour of my 2013-2014 second-grade classroom and how I set it up mid-year when we moved.

Front Door Welcome

We live in a warmer climate and have exterior doors. Here is a picture of our front door. I had students put their lunch bags outside so they wouldn’t take up room inside.

The above welcome sign is from First Grade Smiles and I’m not sure where the poster is from (no credit), but I had it printed at Vista Print.  The lunch sign I printed with my cameo.  I love how it came out!

Classroom Entry

I call this the “wall of rotations”.  We have our behavior chart, which I’ve revised to include bathroom monitoring, too.  The kiddos all start out with nothing in their slot.  There are yellow, orange, and red cards on the side which students move into their slot when the “move their tag”.  On top are two tags, one for girls and one for boys, that students move into their slots when they go to the bathroom.  For the most part, students don’t have to ask me to go to the bathroom, just move the tag to their name so I know who is not in the room.

The job cards are self explanatory.  We have some stability balls in our room which students can use instead of chairs.  There is a rotation chart for it, too.  And, we have our Daily 5 rotation chart.  The New Year Goal Setting Flap Books are from my store.

I cut these snowflakes with my Cameo and hung them up on the windows.  I think I’ll switch them out each month with a themed cut out.  Next month will be hearts.  March will be shamrocks, etc.  I don’t have blinds yet.  The other teachers hung paper up on their windows, but I couldn’t stand to cover up all the light after being in the portables for so long.  I love the natural light. I can essentially shut off my classroom lights and the kiddos can still see enough to write.  Love it!  My only concern is having a Code Red or a Code Blue.  I have paper to cover them, but during a real emergency, it will be interesting.

I call this my teaching wall, although I now have a second thing that is also referred to as my teaching wall, so this is also my carpet area.  I use it for most of my whole group teaching.  Below the numerous plugs (why do I need them every two feet?) are author signs from Teaching Madness and the inspirational quotes are from Crystal Dean.  At least the space below the plug panel is enough for a 8.5 x 11 piece of paper!

On the wall I pin charts and use them throughout the week.  I also started using sentence frames in math along with word cards from Teaching and Tapas.  More on that later.

Here are a couple more walls.  I got a new display bookshelf from Donor’s Choose (more on that later, too!).  I have my math rotations above that (there wasn’t enough room on the other side!).  On the wall near my sink are our bucket filling charts.  I’ve been doing this for a couple months, but just recently purchased The Bucket Filling, Friendship Club by Rulin’ the Roost.  We started it this week and will go through the packet over the next few weeks.  Our class this year needs a lot of work on social skills.

These photos are displayed in here small, but you can click on them to enlarge them to full size.  The top is my computer area and math wall.  It’s a bit bare at this point, but as we review / learn new math concepts, I’ll put more up there.

Next to our computer area is our student mail boxes (I call them their files), our math work station boxes and AR point ribbons.  I don’t push AR in my room, but just teach students how to use it and suggest every once in a while that they take a test.  A few have taken to it, but it’s not something I require.

The next photo is our classroom library and stability ball storage area.  It also houses our rainy day games and text books (I rarely teach out of a text book).  On the wall is our Math Fact chart and Leveled Books levels for about half my students who are working below grade level.  The classroom library is a MESS!  I wanted to redo it during the break, but with the move and my “what should I do” mentality, it didn’t get done.  I’ve figured out what I want to do, though!  That will be a project for this spring when my student teacher comes back!  I plan on having my leveled readers on the top shelf (where they are now) and separating the other books into fiction / nonfiction with genre / theme labeled bins.  I recently got some leveled nonfiction readers from Donor’s Choose & Lakeshore (more on that later, too).  I love the boxes, so I wrote another Donor’s Choose project for some more leveled books and just some book boxes to organize our library.

The bottom photo is our Daily 5 Work on Writing and Work on Words possibilities.  It’s missing a few photos and I needed to buy some hooks that still need to go up for the choice cards.

The following photos are also going to display small, but you can click on them to make them larger.

This is my small group teaching area and desk area. I got rid of my teacher desk several years ago, but basically have a “place” in the room for my stuff.  It’s still a mess and not decorated, yet.  Soon hopefully!

The following are just large, whole class photos, from different angles and walls that give you a good idea of the space and puts everything into perspective.

This photo shows all the windows I love! Students keep their book boxes in the cubbies below the windows.  I adjust the shelves to fit their book boxes.  Some tall books don’t quite fit, but for the most part, it keeps the boxes out of the way during the day.  The cubbies also have their table supplies and extra scissors, glue, etc.

This wall shows our alphabet and computer / sink area.

Here is the true teaching wall.  All four panels of the whiteboard slide so I can move things around.  Love it!  Behind the whiteboard is a ton of storage area.

I know it’s a bit odd to do a classroom tour in January, but these were unusual circumstances – moving in January!  I should have put up some more bulletin boards (like colored paper and borders), but I didn’t have time and wanted to get the “stuff” up on the walls for students to use.  Next year or maybe later this year when things calm down a bit I’ll add more paper and borders.

I only lost / misplaced one thing: our classroom job cards.  After unpacking all the boxes, I still can’t find them.  They’ll probably turn up in April or something.  I remade them yesterday. Luckily, I had the digital files and just needed to print and laminate them.

I love my new room and am so thankful for the clean, new space for my students.