Colorize Your Classroom

Today I have a fun tip for saving ink and making your classroom oh so colorful - bright paper! My school doesn't have color printers, so everything that I want in color, I have to print at home.  It was a big shock to me a few years ago and I went through cartridge after cartridge trying to bring color into my classroom.  As we know, color can cultivate creativity and make a classroom warm and inviting. But did you also know that it can increase retention by 18%, accelerate learning by 55-78%, and also increase comprehension by 73%? (According to the Color Marketing Group).  Color is pretty amazing! 

I couldn't keep spending my whole paycheck on ink, so I started making things for my classroom in blackline and printing them on colored paper.  They still look great! So when Astrobrights contacted me about sampling their line of colors, I was so excited! I knew these would be wonderful for my classroom!

Here are all the colors that Astrobrights makes - in regular paper and in cardstock.

I printed vocab cards for Enemy Pie, from Stephanie Stewart's Back to School Bash.

I printed my math critical thinking question freebie to post around my calendar.

I printed this Juice Box Bully craft from Across the Hall in 2nd Grade's Bully Book Pack.  The great thing about using colored cardstock for crafts is that the paper fits perfectly in the copy machine! So easy! 

And here's a little sneak peek at my finished classroom! This is my math wall.  Can you spot the question discussion starters? 

Astrobrights is having an awesome back to school contest where one teacher from each state can win a $250 gift card to colorize their classroom.  You can enter through their facebook page! All you have to do is share a picture of how you colorize your classroom!  You can get more details at ColorizeYourClassroom.com.

But lucky for us - one Teaching With Style reader will also win this same box full of paper, plus a $50 gift card to Office Depot! Woot! Good luck! 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Nicole Heinlein

Recyclable Organization!

I use cooperative groups with shared supplies in my classroom. Not only does this help students learn to share and get along with many different people, it also facilitates speaking and listening.

In the center of my tables I have these baskets from Really Good Stuff.  I've had them for 6 years now and they are still going strong!

However, after 6 years of having a primary color rainbow theme, I'm going to spray paint them for my new bright color theme for next year.  I haven't done that yet, so I'll be back with a tutorial of how it's done.

Inside these caddies, I keep pencils, scissors, and glue bottles.  The glue bottles stand up in the large compartment, and I put the pencils and scissors in little cups in the smaller compartments.  My first year of teaching, I bought cute plastic juice cups, but those promptly broke that year.  Since then, I've transitioned to recyclables.  If they get nasty, I can easily replace!

My favorites are yogurt containers for the scissors and Welches frozen juice containers for the pencils.

I bought pretty grey and white chevron contact paper from Amazon {you can find it here!}  I like this because it has grid lines on the back that make cutting it a snap!

After measuring and cutting, I just wrapped it around my containers.  They instantly look better!  I could try to remove the painted on labels with acetone {like this pin}, but I don't have acetone and It doesn't bother me that the old labels show through a tiny bit.  

I'm linking up with Monday Made-It

How do you organize your shared supplies?

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Nicole Heinlein

Pencil Sharpeners

Do you have a love-hate relationship with your pencil sharpener?  I had a hand crank one in my room that I completely removed because A. it didn't work well, B. it took forever to sharpen a pencil, and C. it was screwed into a weird spot behind my desk.  Electric pencil sharpeners are better because they sharpen so much faster, but if you let kids use them, they can break pretty easily.  At my old school, I had an electric sharpener, but I never let students use it.  Those things are so expensive - some can be around $50 and have to be replaced each year if the motor dies!  So, when Classroom Friendly Supplies offered to send me a free pencil sharpener to review, I was ecstatic!

When we moved to Hawaii a month ago, I packed one suitcase full of teaching supplies I would absolutely need for the first two weeks until our container of all our belongings arrived.  Unfortunately, we've been here 4 weeks and we are still sleeping on the floor on borrowed blow-up mattresses and futons.  I am so happy I brought that suitcase for my classroom!  In it, I packed cardboard magazine files from Ikea for book boxes, chimes for my attention signal, Kreative in Kinder's Rainbow Classroom Decor all printed out, laminated, cut, and ready to hang, a schedule pocket chart, a turn-in basket, black sheets and new trimmer for my bulletin boards, a good pair of scissors, a pack of Ticonderoga pencils, and my new pencil sharpener.

Here is a video of my son sharpening some pencils after school.  He's a pro!

I taught him how to use it first, and he would come in and happily sharpen pencils after school!  I just started classroom jobs in my room, so now one student does it.  I love that I can rely on the kids to sharpen pencils instead of being so worried that the kids will break the sharpener.  And at $24.99, this sharpener won't break the bank, even the frugalest of teachers.  If you order more than one, you get a bigger discount, too, so team up with other teachers at your school!

Tell me about your sharpener:  Do you have an electric one?  Do you allow students to use it?  Maybe you have students bring in those tiny ones from home? Or maybe you, too, have this amazing sharpener that is not only quiet, but easy to use!  I'd love to hear how you handle this conundrum!

I was given a pencil sharpener free of charge to review.  The opinions stated are completely my own.

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Nicole Heinlein