The School Room

Our school room (schoolroom, school-room??) is a small, two-doored internal room with an awkward screened window facing the hallway.  I'm guessing it's one of those situations where it was originally an external wall (the window has bars on it!!), but at some point an addition was made onto the house, making it... quirky.

Since it's small (two twin-sized beds might fit next to each other in the small space..), we have turned it into a school room.  It's perfect for that function!  It gives us some space to work and unpack all our crafts and books without creating a disaster-zone in the main part of the house.

We moved into this house last October and were part-way through the school-year already.  So the room was functional for first grade, but not pretty.  One of my goals for this summer was to turn it into "The Schoolroom."  I really think it worked, too!

And now for all those pictures I've been trying to post...

The Front of the Room.  I turned the awkward metal-screen-and-barred-window into a magnet board.  I glued magnets to the back of pictures, clothespins, and mini-whiteboards to create a place to hang things in the front of the room.  The front of the room also holds all our books, supplies, craft materials, and chart-paper (on the back of the door).

The Back of the Room.  We moved our repurposed-world-map-shower-curtain to the back wall.  It also has a chair for me (you can't see it well from this angle), a table for my teacher's guides and materials, the printer, etc.  You can also see part of the timeline (at the top) that starts at creation at the front of the room and goes all the way around to the chalkboard.  Micaiah and I both really enjoy seeing it (thanks My Father's World first grade!!), so we are keeping it up! 

Micaiah's books/materials.  Well, for the first day anyway.  Second grade is going to be a big leap from first grade, where she had fewer hours and fewer subjects.  We are starting the first year of the 5 year cycle by My Father's World, and it's called Exploring Countries and Cultures.  Sounds like fun, doesn't it?!  We're also starting handwriting and spelling this year as well as consistently/daily doing fine arts (music or art) and science.

The Chalkboard!  It was supposed to be a half-wall board, but due to dripping below my "line," we turned it into a full-length board.  We love it, and it is quickly becoming the focal point of the room!  

A close-up of part of the board.... see that little note from Micaiah?  If you can't read it, the part below "welcome to second grade" says "I'm exited" from Micaiah. :)  .... we'll be working on spelling this year (excited, not exited)... but it sure has been fun to leave each other little notes as we gear up for second grade!

I hope you enjoyed the tour of the schoolroom!  

-JLR