{Our Schoolroom} in a Bag
| August 12, 2012 | Posted by Mommy Cameron under Homeschooling |
Posted in Homeschooling |
This year we have been trying something a little different with our school room. For the past year, we have mainly conducted school in our “schoolroom” aka our formal dining room. I spent a lot of time getting this room set up.
We have a large table for everyone to sit around.
In this picture it is covered for a home learners co op class.
I have two large bookcases.
One bookcase holds all our craft supplies (paint, paper, play dough, pipecleaners, paper plates, popsicle sticks, etc.)
The other holds the more “school” supplies like math manipulatives, magnifying glasses, science supplies, reference books, small whiteboards, calendar pieces, etc.
Although this room gets used daily for the boys craft adventures, it is no longer our primary school room. Instead, we have had school…
in Thing 1′s room,
in the living room,
in my bedroom,
outside,
in the breakfast nook,
in the playroom.
and, of course in the classroom.
We have moved away from workboxes, which tie us to one room and I have created a classroom all in one bag. One reason I am able to do this so easily is because I do not use the teacher’s manuals for any subject on a daily basis, so I don’t have to carry them around with me. Instead, like I shared in my lesson plan post, each boy has a notebook, that contains their lesson plans, worksheets, and books they may need, for the next 4 weeks, as well as crayons, paper, pencil, whiteboard, and markers. Thus, I only have to pull out their notebook and we can start. For those weeks when we made need some special supplies, like sugar cubes to make a replica of the Great Wall of China, I just throw them in a zipoc bag and put them in the bag. (On a side note, we don’t do a lot of worksheets, I like to try to conserve paper, so we use our dry erase boards a lot, but the boys love them. I usually take pictures of their work so that I have a copy of the work without all the extra paper.)
Besides the boys notebooks, the inside of the bag also contains a couple of clipboards and any books that don’t fit inside the boys notebooks.
In the outside pockets of the bag I have added extra supplies like, pencils, pens, dry erase markers, dry erase eraser, scissors, glue, stapler, rocks (math manipulatives), letter tiles, measuring tape, calculator (for me), and anything else we might need.
Thing 1, Thing 2 and I have really enjoyed being able to do school where ever we want each day. I am hoping that as it cools down some, we will be able to go outside to do school more and all I have to do is pick up the bag and go.
Don’t worry, all those manipulatives on the bookshelfs, we use them regularily when we are at home, but I always have the bare essentials in my bag.
What does your schoolroom look like?
I love how portable you are! I have setup a space for the first time (my son is starting K next week). So we will see how much we actually use the space or how much we move around the house