My Perfect Classroom

For the past 10 years I have been working in the special education department of an urban public school.  Needless to say, I understand what it is like to scrounge for things for our classroom because we don’t have a budget.  I have done my share of rummaging through other teachers trashed items and finding a barely broken toy that my students would love.  I also have experience in many general education teachers’ rooms, so between that and hours of obsessing over Pintrest I have seen different setups and decorating ideas for my classroom. 

In a perfect world where I could have unlimited funds and take what I have seen in other classrooms and online, I believe I have a good idea of what my perfect classroom would look like.  In front of the room I would like to have a Smart board.  Around the Smart board I would have a poster of class expectations, a calendar of events, and our Specials schedule.  I would also like to have a behavior chart for the students as a visual reminder of how they are or should be behaving.  Rather than having inspirational posters and things like that hanging around the room, I would have the students’ work and drawings hanging up.  I think they would feel a sense of pride in having their work up for all to see.     

As I said earlier, this is my idea of a classroom in a perfect world.  In that world I would like to have my students’ desks set up in groups of 4.  I understand that normally I would run into students chatting, fooling around, or copying each other’s work, but I would like to have them in groups for several reasons.  One reason would be to allow the students to work in small groups on certain assignments.  Another reason would be because I want to incorporate center work into my day.  Having the desks set up in groups already would avoid having to have the class rearrange the room all the time.  My desk would be off to the side in the front of the room.  This would allow me to view the whole class while they are doing quiet work, and also let me have enough room in the front to move around and conduct my lessons.  In the back of the room I would have a smaller table to run my reading groups and do small group lessons. 

I would like to have a library in a corner with different levels of books from all genres.  I want it to be a comfy corner with a plush carpet and bean bag chairs for the students to relax and enjoy reading in.  I also want a small table with a few CD players for the students to listen to books on CD.  Instead of having computers in the room, I want tablets that the students can play phonics or math apps, read online books, or work for as a reinforcer.  In the opposite corner I would like shelves of math manipulatives.  I want these manipulatives accessible to the students so that they can use various methods to solve the problems they are assigned.