Preparing for the beginning of a new school year can be daunting to say the least. However, as long as you’re organized, you can maximize your chances of getting things off to a smooth start. With this in mind, it’s a good idea to put some careful thought into exactly how your classroom is designed and decorated, and here are some top tips to help you along the way.
Make a room plan
The layout of your classroom can make a big difference to the atmosphere within the space and to how children respond to your teaching methods. One of the most important decisions you’ll need to make when it comes to planning your classroom is how to arrange pupils’ desks. Perhaps you’ll decide to put these items of furniture in rows or in a horseshoe shape, or maybe you’d prefer to place them in clusters to encourage group work. Whichever arrangement you opt for, it’s crucial that you can hold the attention and concentration of your students. You should also be able to move around the room quickly and easily, and you shouldn’t struggle to keep an eye on all of your students.
If you’re teaching younger students, it’s helpful to incorporate a degree of flexibility and variety into your classroom design. For example, you may wish to include a quiet reading area or a space where all your students can gather during registration. This adds interest to rooms and helps to ensure they are not boring for youngsters.
Do some decorating
To help fire pupils’ imaginations, it’s important to ensure the room looks appealing and so plenty of color and interesting design features are a must. For example, posters, class calendars and display boards can make great additions to your walls. You might wish to include aluminum framed pinboards in your classroom. These handy products are perfect if you want to display pupils’ work, and because they come in a variety of vibrant colors, they look superb even when they are bare. This is useful at the start of the year, when you may be lacking examples of student projects to showcase. Firms such as Display Developments provide a range of these pinboards in colors such as blue, green, burgundy and scarlet.
School curriculum notice boards can also enhance classrooms. These items can be used to create neat, attractive displays and they also allow you to provide evidence of your pupils’ work for OFSTED Curriculum Areas of Learning. Extra touches like these may help to impress inspectors.
Get your supplies in order
Before your new class walks through your door at the start of term, you’ll need to make sure you know exactly where all your supplies are. If you misplace any items of stationery, art supplies or other resources, you risk looking under prepared during lessons.
It’s also crucial that the items are arranged in an organized fashion so that when your students need to access them, they can do so quickly and easily. For example, you might want to divide your art supplies into different colours to make them easier to distribute.
Test your interactive whiteboard
If you’ll be using an interactive whiteboard for the first time, or you have used one in the past but you’re not confident with the technology, make sure you get some practice in before your students arrive. These pieces of equipment represent a superb learning aid, but they can take a little getting used to.
By spending some time planning your classroom for the new academic year, you can iron out any potential problems and help ensure you provide a welcoming and stimulating environment for your pupils to learn in.
