a classroom in waiting

less is more

I have been spending time in my classroom getting it ready for the new crew of kidlets to take it over and make it their own.

I have been teaching for a good long time.  It is easy to amass treasures. Or what I think is treasure. Or what used to be treasure.

This year my mantra is "reduce-simplify-declutter",  Everything that stays in the room has to be useful, beautiful and to have been used in the last couple of years.  If not, it goes to the garbage, the Thrift Shop pile or the giveaway box outside my door.

I putter about, sorting out dress up clothes, organizing puzzles, emptying out cupboards and generally making the room messier than it was when I walked in.

Progress is measured in the amount of stuff in the piles to leave the classroom, not the mess in the classroom!

I want more space in between items on the shelves.  Fewer shelves in the shelving unit.  Empty counter tops and window sills.  More space for the learning and creativity that will take place.

I deliberately say "space" instead of "room".  I have no more "room" in my classroom than I did when I walked in.  I have not moved out any furniture.  The footprint is the same as it was before.

The infrastructure is there. The tables, the chairs, the shelving units, the house set up. The alphabet charts are up.  Numbers are on the wall.  Books are everywhere (in neatly labelled baskets).   A beach sensory bin invites investigation.  Puzzles, and manipulatives and montessori style trays are waiting on the shelves.

As I reduce the space taken up by "stuff" (requiring me to be more intentional and selective) I leave more space.

Space for investigating, creating, questioning, imagining, laughing, helping, trying, trying again, discovering ...

The room is in waiting.

Waiting for its purpose in being.

Waiting for its children.



My thanks to Miss Night Mutters who posted about creating a sense of place for her kidlets.  

5 comments

  1. So honoured to have inspired this! The work of preparing a classroom for children has come to feel so sacred to me, and I love that moment, when I realise that all the room needs now.... is children. Beautiful post.

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  2. Have nothing in your houses that you don't know to be useful or believe to be beautiful. - designer William Morris

    Bravo to you. Have nothing in your classrooms that your students do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.

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  3. I used that WIlliam Morris quote when renovating my home. Seems to apply to the classroom too.

    sandi

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  4. I fully agree with space and have been doing the same thing. I am inspired by Reggio rooms.

    Liz :)

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