Teaching Ideas We Are Thankful For {Amna from Teach Two Reach}

Finding time to run centers in my room with the amount of (really- lack of), time I have in my Language Arts block has been a yearly struggle for me. I have 80 minutes a day to teach everything related to Language Arts - reading, writing, spelling, grammar, centers..etc. Even having another 20 minutes would be so helpful! 

This year I am thankful for buying these 10 drawer rolling carts. One of them has helped me manage my center time for word work. 

I have two spelling lists a week- regular and challenge. I make copies of the lists and put them in the top drawer. Students know which list they are supposed to get. 

When they are at the word work station, they take out their spelling list from the drawer, and choose one of the centers I have in each drawer. I laminated the directions for each activity and put it on the top. Underneath I have a file folder for recording sheets. 

Next to the rolling cart is the shelf station where I have items that may be needed for some of the word work such as keyboards (Thank goodness for dads who keep the keyboards to all the computers they've ever owned), stamp pads, stamps, letter tiles, dry erase boards, etc. 

Everything has a place and when the rotation ends, students know how and where to put everything back. If they are working on a recording sheet, they keep that in their center folders. Students mark down the word work activity on a sheet in their folder so I can keep track and make sure they don't keep on doing the same ones every time. They have to do a variety of the activities whenever they go to the station. 

Having everything in one place, where students can just pull out what they need, has helped me tons this year with time management and trying to move through centers pretty quick so we can get in all the rotations. 

The other cart I have is for math centers. I'm thinking of getting another one for regular literacy centers too. 

Do you have an amazing organization strategy for word work centers? 

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