When I was hired for my first teaching job, it was 6 days before school started. Insert minor panic attack here. My mind was so focused on getting my class lists, figuring out what I was supposed to teach, and not having a mental breakdown. The furthest thing from my mind was, "What should I put on the walls of my classroom? What color scheme would be best? Should there be a theme?"
Fortunately, I had some WONDERFUL family members that were thinking those questions for me and coming up with ideas. Better yet, they were creating and decorating for me! I realized on Back to School Night that if my classroom hadn't been decorated, it wouldn't have been nearly as inviting or exciting for my students.
So today I'm going to share some ideas of why and how to decorate your classroom!
One of my sisters-in-law teaches school as well and my mother-in-law is a fabulous artist and loves to decorate. Thus, cute and fun decorations! Her favorite decoration tool is foam core + tempera paint. Anyone can do this really. You paint something, outline in black, cut out with a razor blade or bandsaw and presto! Unique and fun decorations for your classroom. Here are some pictures of some of the decorations I used from her...
All things PIRATES filled our classroom my first year. We had seagulls flying over head and a pirate boy (in the back corner) reminding us to "Make reading your greatest treasure". There were also a boat dock at the back of the room with even more seagulls. Outside above the coat racks was a sunken pirate ship as well.
After my 1st year experiences I thought a Circus Theme would be perfect for my second year of teaching. Here are some of the foam core decorations made by my MIL.
When you decorate around a specific theme, students get excited. They begin to identify with it, and the better the theme the longer they'll identify. When I did pirates, my students were still excited to play pirate games on the last day of school and were working to earn Gold Coins until the bitter end. It worked really well. The circus love didn't last as long (I loved it until the very end though!) but it was still exciting and happy throughout the entire year.
Here is a list of other themes that can really be fun and exciting for most grade levels (some may be better suited for younger or older students):
~ Camping
~ Outer Space
~ Under the Sea
~ Superheroes (What I was planning on doing in my third year of teaching)
~ Candyland
~ Old West
~ Dr. Seuss
~ Hollywood/Movies
~ Jungle
~ Egypt
~ A favorite book (i.e. Harry Potter, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom)
~ Greek Mythology
I've seen a lot of rooms that have a more generic decorating theme (i.e. owls, apples, rainbow) but I truly believe something more specific will help the teacher and students in the long run. It helps the students like I said above to attach themselves to the classroom. It provides more class pride because they are obviously part of something that no other class is. It helps the teacher because once you have a theme, hundreds of ideas and projects will stem from it. When I committed to a theme I immediately started thinking of how my rules, behavior system, beginning of year art projects, getting to know you activities, and more could relate to the theme. Even if it was just putting a clown face at the top of a learning style quiz (you can find one of those here via Laura Candler - love her!) it made a difference. A decorating theme may seem like a lot of work, and it can be, but I know it is well worth any and all efforts. Plus if you can get someone to help you then it makes it that much easier...right Valerie? ;)
Valerie made the perfect pom poms and super cute name bunting for my desk in my first year among MANY other things. Thanks again!
I would love to hear about more classroom themes that have worked for you and to create a greater master list for teachers that would love more classroom decorating ideas.
Natalie
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