Summer Weather is Here and My Classroom is in Progress

It has been ridiculously hot this week here in Iowa.  I know, I know...I complained about the weather a few short weeks ago because I wanted summer, but is there no in between from cloudy and cold to sunny and unbearable?!  Evidently not.

This week has gone by really quickly - between having my sweet nephew and niece here for a few days, getting our dance team ready for camp next week, and beginning work in my classroom - I can't believe it's already Friday!  

I had a little reality check earlier this week when I looked at my calendar closely.  Students will be in my classroom in less than 4 weeks.  {Lets take a moment to take a deep breath and let that set in...}  I will be gone most of next week and the week before school starts we have teacher meetings - which leaves me essentially a week and a half.  WHAT?!  Sooooo...I spent about 8 solid hours in my room on Wednesday.  I even enlisted the help of my 12-year-old step daughter Kaitlyn.  When I left that night, I at least felt like I could reasonably be prepared for school to start...that makes me a lot relieved.

Behold the progress that was made:

This is how the room started.  View from my desk.  Note the computers all bagged up, the desks in disarray, above my cabinet full of who knows what.   

View from the back of my room.  It doesn't look bad in this picture, but it was not good. 

This is what the desks looked like.  Construction dust was EVERYWHERE.  All of them had to be re-cleaned.  Not a huge deal...but certainly time consuming. 

A bit of progress.  Desks re-arranged.  Small group table in a more appropriate spot than smack dab in the middle of the front of my room.

More progress.  Computers un-bagged and plugged in {Thank you, Kaitlyn!}, top of cabinets making progress, desks in final arrangement.  Looking more like a classroom.    :)

My not-so-little helper.  She was SO much help yesterday.  Crawling on the floor, vacuuming, hanging letters on my wall, moving furniture.  I could've never gotten as much done without her.

This is how I organize my bulletin board letters.  In a recipe box with alphabetic dividers.  The hot mess you see sprawled on the desk would be the miscellaneous characters - numbers, punctuation, etc.  That mess is now located in a large ziplock baggie.  That's going to need a little attention at some point.  I dislike having to search for things...it makes my OCD brain uncomfortable.  :)

The finished product of the word wall.  This wall gets filled with reading strategy anchor charts throughout the year.  And who doesn't love Dr. Seuss?  

 Anyway, that's all for today.  I'll show more classroom pictures once it's all done.

Have a wonderful weekend, Friends -