Organization of my Classroom...

I've been in my classroom now for three years, and I think I FINALLY have it organized in the way that makes sense to me.  And my assistant.  

First, let me say that I work at a university lab school (preschool) with five classrooms.  All of them, except mine, have storage closets and/or shelves for storing rotating materials.  EXCEPT MINE.  I have a small cave of an office, which can't really be used for working in (it's about 5' x 10 ft) since the computer is out in the classroom.  I like the computer in the classroom because we use it a lot with the children.  Over the last couple of years, I've had some shelves added above the computer desk to store bins on, and moved a large cabinet out of the office to store art materials in.   But that still didn't give me any good place to store materials that I rotate in my centers.  I couldn't find anything when I need it, but everything was underfoot when I didn't need it! 

This summer, I spent time every week procuring shelves for the office.  We used to keep the rest time cots in the office too, but that was difficult to get them out and put them back, so I never liked that situation at all.  As we added shelves (all of them--5-- free through surplus and donations), we moved the cots into a corner of the classroom.  While we were closed this summer, I took everything out of the office and off the shelves and from everywhere else I had them stashed, and sorted them into centers.  I labeled several shelves for each center-- art, play dough, light table/mirror, science, outdoors, block center materials, math, literacy, classroom decorations.  I then sorted all the materials into bins on the shelves.  I INSIST that everyone put things back on the shelves they came from, and make sure to do it myself.  

This year so far has been so EASY!  I haven't spent any time searching for this or that, and I've even found things that other people can't find.  The bins on the shelves are for things we do every year and various celebrations and decorations like Valentine's Day, Chinese New Year, etc.  

I try to set out our art materials for the week, and the books we are going to read that week as well.  That makes for easy set up every day.  I try to clear off the computer desk at the end of each day, and faithfully keep a to-do list daily.  On Friday, I make a list of anything special we are doing the next week so I can do any shopping I need to or make any requests from my administration or coworkers.  So far, so good.