Moving Classrooms

This is the start of my eleventh year teaching. I have taught at the same great school for all of these years, so you'd think that by now this back to school time would be easy. Just dust of the book cases, uncover the bulletin boards, and put up a few labels. It's never that easy, especially in my case. In these eleven years, I have moved classrooms FIVE different times to four different classrooms.  With each move, there is a number of things you need to consider.

1.  How will your class be moved? On several occasions the classroom was moved by summer custodial staff. Everything needed to be packed in a box.  I have so many better uses for packing tape around my classroom than on the bottom of boxes!  Other times, when things had been planned well in advance, things could be moved before the end of the previous school year. That's what happened for this move. On the last day of school, each of my fourth grade students grabbed one small stack of items like a pillow, book box, or bin. We lined up and marched down to the new classroom and piled the items up on a counter that the other teacher cleared off for us. After 3 trips like this, our classroom was looking empty with just the large items left for the professionals over the summer.  

2.  When will your room be ready to unpack? All of our rooms are deep cleaned over the summer.  Consider where your new room falls on the lineup. If possible, unpack before.  You are going to make a big mess. You'll be surprised how much dust collects at the bottom of those bins that you are unpacking.  You might as well empty that before the floor is freshly waxed.  

3. What the flow of this space like? Each of the rooms that I have been in have been slightly different even though they are in the same school. You've got to figure out the best space for the group meeting spots, where the classroom library will go, do you have room for shelves without blocking any spots making the unsafe. Where will you put the often used supplies like writing paper or math manipulatives to grab. How will each bulletin board be used?  In every plan that I make, I also underestimate the amount of space all the desks and tables take. 

4.  How much time do you have? If you have time as you are packing up, PURGE! I go by the two year rule. If I haven't used it in two years, it's gone. I switch things up as I move with my students from third to fourth grade, so I give things two years just to make sure. If you didn't have time while packing, do this purge while unpacking. You may say to yourself over and over, "Why did I move this?"  If you are short on time, closed storage is a great thing.  Just put that bin in the cupboard, close that door, and work on the must do things.  When parents come for the school Open House night, they will appreciate your hard work and not even know that there are still bins of professional development texts that haven't found a spot on your bookshelf.  

5. What do you take with?  What do you leave behind?  In our school, the rule is if the district purchased it, it stays in the classroom. You pack up your personal items.  We've all seen that typical brown box that a person in the private sector uses to pack up their personal things when they leave a job.  That's not the case for teachers.  90% of my classroom library has been purchased by me (not all at full price, most used rummage sale finds).  Every bin, border, cushion, and curtain is my own personal property.  So if you take that into consideration, I left behind a stack of dictionaries, handful of text for classroom library, some base ten blocks and math games, mini dry erase boards, and whatever posters and files I thought I wouldn't need again. I hope the next occupant got a head start rummage sale-ing this summer!

Moving classrooms is never easy, but you do get to re-invent and re-fresh your classroom every time! I'd recommend everyone try it at least 5 times!