A New Adventure

What a summer! Today is September the first and this summer has FLOWN! Along with moving 2000km home, we were in two weddings, did a Pre-War car tour weekend, AND I managed to apply for many jobs, interview for four and finally snag one on TUESDAY. Yup, school starts this week. Eeek!

My new job is teaching Music and French in two different schools. I start every morning in one school and then drive 15 minutes to the other school to finish my days. I will have a total of about 90 students at both schools in grades primary to six. I will teach Music to all grades and French to grades four to six.

This means that I have three classrooms to decorate (I have separate French and Music rooms at one school). I have taught Music as a specialist before, but not French. I have taught French to my own students in Ontario. The whole concept is a little overwhelming! But classes don't begin until Thursday, so we only have two days this week to worry about, so that helps. 

Here are a few before pics of my rooms.

 School #1: Multipurpose room. This room is used by others when I am not there, so I only really get about half of the room to decorate, etc. Three big tables with chairs for French (I only have about 14 students at a time here).

 School #1: View from the other side. This open space will be the music side of the room. This school is also very picky about things being stuck on the walls. They insist you stick to bulletin boards to appease the Fire Inspectors.

 School #2: Music Room. Big open space... with four large columns. Still, it is a great room. In the basement, so I won't disturb anyone with our "noise"! Piano in the corner.

School #2: Full set of Ukeleles. I might just have to teach myself to play! lol There is also about a half set of guitars, so I will need to wrap my head around that.

I forgot to take before pics of my French room at School #2. It was a storage room, so I pulled in my husband and he helped me clean it out and move furniture. It's a huge room, but the back third is still full of "stuff" that the admin team is going to sort through by the end of September, to make things neater!

I am really excited and really nervous taking on this new job. The staff at both schools seem really supportive and nice. I even have a French teacher from a neighbour school who is willing to sit down and go through curriculum with me! I LOVE small towns!

I will be posting more "specials"-type lessons and strategies here now, as that is my new world. I have learned there are not a lot of blogs dedicated to that area of the education world, so hopefully mine will help someone!

See you soon!


 

Show Me Your Clutter!

Week#1 Clutter Free Classroom Challenge

Well, this week's challenge scares me to death!

The challenge is to share photos of some clutter spots in our classrooms. I made it into my room last night to gather a few things to work on at home this weekend. So I snapped a few photos with my iPad (please excuse the low quality!) 

These are the key areas I want to work on during this challenge. I didn't take pictures of the areas that are already organized and working well (which I was pleased to notice were more than I thought!) as these are supposed to prompt me to get my butt in gear!

These shelves are near my Guided Reading table. I am quite pleased with my baskets. This was a summer project and has worked quite well. EXCEPT my extras, and books, etc, seem to end up on the top. I have a nicely organized bucket with supplies in it, but there never seems to be enough space to store my books and pieces. I have 4 reading groups (in two grade levels). This MUST be dealt with!)

Another success area, our mailboxes. These bins work really well. The students drop off their GO Books (communications folders) in the morning and they are checked by myself or my EA and moved to the "To Go Home" bin. All finished work is put in the "To Mrs M" basket, which has helped me not to lose piles of papers this year, BUT it always seems to be overflowing. So this is one area I want to work on!

This beautiful monstrosity is a random set of built in cupboards near the fire exit in my room. Don't get me wrong, I love the storage space, but this shelf gathers clutter like a magnet! Things get sat there and are never heard from again!

My "Art Supply" drawer, begun by the teacher in the room before me. Great supplies, but I don't even know what is in there and it looks super messy!

So there you have it. My dirty laundry flapping in the wind. Maybe my self esteem would have been bolstered if I had posted the "good" pictures of my room too, but change is never easy. I feel like I am halfway there!I have a lot of the systems in place, I just need to USE them!

Thanks for peeking and supporting me in this endeavor! I look forward to the next few weeks!

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