Weekly Wrap-up: Our school space

I had mentioned a while back that we were going to renovate the sensory room and turn it into a school room. Well, that is still on out "to do" list but for now had been put on hold until we can save up a little bit of money to pay for it.  (Maybe next summer??)  In the meantime I still needed (I should say wanted) a space that was dedicated solely for school.  My dining room was being over taken with school things and I was quickly loosing my organization.  I dedicated a couple of nights to cleaning and organizing and I managed to put together a nice school area for the kids.  Boy do they LOVE it!

This is what you first see when you walk into the room.  This is our "work table" where the kids and I sit to do their work.  We pray, say the Pledge of Allegiance, review the calender, the weather and what we are learning for the week (letter, number, bible concept, character trait etc).  After we finish with this we go to our "daily's" which is a traceable calender sheet, a tally sheet to track how many days of school we have had each month, a count down sheet to the 100th day of school, and a chart tracking the weather on school days.  Then we move on to our workboxes.

Our workbox system is pretty simple right now.  Once the kids move in to elementary level work I'm sure it will get more complicated, but for now simple is good.  Each child has 5 workboxes (pink, orange  green, blue, and purple).  There are stickers on the boxes with their names as well.  In each box they have one assignment or small project to complete.  Once they are done they put their complete work in the basket on the top which is our "all done basket".   I LOVE this system!  It not only keeps things organized and on track, but it also gives the kids a break where they can get up and move around a little!  After all of our workboxes are done we move on to station.

I created small stations for activities throughout the room to focus on particular skills.  I have 4 stations.  They are reading, table (fine motor), easel, and puzzles.  The reading station has books with flip open flaps and fun pictures.  We also have books that have been read during previous weeks.  This is one of Sassy's favorite stations.  She is definitely a book girl!

Then we have a small table with a fine motor activity or a fun sensory activity.  The kids love coming over to see what new activity is at the table.  I leave the activity there for the week for them to enjoy.

Next is easel.  One side is a white board with dry erase crayons (one of my favorites!) and the other side has a chalkboard with chalk.

And finally we have the puzzle station.  I have a mat on the floor for them to lay on, but Peanut of course has it all floded up so he can hang off it a little!  I rotate the puzzles daily and I change them up from simple puzzles (like the one in the picture) to complex 3-D puzzles.

The kids pick their stations and go off on their own for the most part.  I go from one child to the other working with them on what they are doing.  At times the other child may get interested in what mommy is helping with and may come over to participate.  Suddenly our independent stations turn into a group activity (which I love!) and we have fun together!

So that is our school room for Kindergarten!

Where I'm linking up this week: