A School Room That Works

Welcome Blog Hoppers!  This post was originally published exactly one month ago today.  Weird.  What can I say?  I’m a woman before my time.  That or I’m out of the loop.

We’ve tried numerous school room/school nook scenarios.  They haven’t worked.  They were out of the main part of the house where I couldn’t keep an eye on the little ones, with all their desks separate I couldn’t stack their school books by them, I didn’t have everything I needed at hand, or it was all so exposed on wire shelves that it made the room look not so great.

With 5 kiddos ranging in age from 4th grade to 10 months we had to get creative.

Here’s what’s working right now:

We keep all the art supplies where they can get to them at all times – on the computer desk.  I separate them by type:  all glue in one bucket, all paints in another, all chalk, all crayons, stamps, etc.

This is just one of the basket collections on the computer desk.  It takes so many, you know.  I keep one small handy bucket for everyday schoolwork so I can grab just one bucket and get us started right away.  That little silver one up there with the assortment of supplies.  Pencils, glue, scissors, crayons, chalk for me, pencil sharpener all in one little bucket to set in the middle of the table for our table time.

I keep all our paper in the computer desk drawer where even the 3 year old can reach it.

Here’s another handy tip we use:

When I open a new ream of paper I take a stack of it and cut it in half before putting it in the drawer.  With all the quick scribbles of the 3 and 5 year olds – we go through a lot of paper.  This way we go through it half as quickly.

I can’t wait for all the back-to-school supplies to be marked way down so we can stock up again!  Did you know we’re still using some of the glue sticks we got last year on sale?  Whee!!

So, how’s your school room look?  What’s your plan for the new year?  What works for you and what doesn’t?  Do you also eat where you learn?

This is linked up with Heart of the Matter Online’s Not Back to School Blog Hop. Jump over there to see where a bunch of other people “do school”!