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Classroom Design Tips for Teachers at the Start of the School Year

Dedham, ME (PRWEB) August 29, 2007 -- Walk into many elementary classrooms during this back-to-school season, and you'll notice a change from your own days as a student -- more bare walls and blank bulletin boards at the start of the year. While the view may be a bit jarring, it is a natural response to current brain research about how children learn, according to Gail Boushey and Joan Moser, two teachers from Washington state who specialize in helping teachers design classrooms to support student learning.

Boushey and Moser, known as "The Sisters" in their work with teachers throughout the country, provide practical tips to educators who want to create environments that maximize learning for students. Those bare walls won't stay bare for long -- the idea is that teachers will quickly fill them up with student artwork, posters, and notes about learning created by children each day.

Boushey and Moser explain that this technique "anchors" learning, according to brain researchers -- if students connect writing or facts on the wall with specific classroom experiences, they are more likely to remember the information. In their workshops, they recommend that wall space be given over to recording the daily learning of new words, books read together as a class, reading and writing goals, and math graphs.

In addition to more bare space in schools at the start of the year, Boushey and Moser encourage teaches to shift to simple, clean designs in classrooms. They help teachers makeover their classrooms by clearing out cluttered areas, and replacing garish and busy cartoon letter motifs common in many elementary classrooms with simple black borders and more student artwork.

Boushey and Moser have four quick design suggestions to personalize classrooms in the first weeks of school. These projects are easy and low-cost, and help young students become comfortable quickly in the new environment:

1. Framed Photos Throughout the Room

Ask each child to bring in a favorite photo from home (these photos often include their family members). Use various frames from the dollar store in many different styles, and scatter the photos all around the room on bookshelves, display areas, or near storage bins.There is an occasional child who doesn't bring in a photo (it could be one is unavailable, given the transient lives of some students). In those cases, snap a photo on the playground and frame it.

2. Face/Name Magnets

Students create these during the first days of school, and then use them every day on graphs to chart their preferences in different tallies. For example, students might place their magnets on the Daily Graph noting their favorite chapter or picture book. Questions of the Day on the Daily Graph early in the year include:

How did you get to school today?

How many people in your family?

What is your favorite ice cream flavor?

What month is your birthday?

These magnets are easy to complete -- all that is needed is Shrinky Dink paper, available at your local craft store. Cut each 8x10 sheet of this special paper into quarters and then trace a simple head and shoulders pattern on each quarter sheet for every child. Children then use colored pencils to decorate their head and add their name to the "chest area." Cut out and bake the shapes as explained in the directions on the Shrinky Dink package, and then glue an extra strong magnet on the back. These personal magnets work great on most white boards and file cabinets.

3. Self-Portraits

These face portraits are a special project early in the year - students draw and color their faces

from the shoulders up, and then the projects are "framed" with black construction paper. Turn the corners of the construction paper frames for more texture and a professional look.

4. Black Framed Student Art

Stock up on black frames from the dollar store - different sizes make this display far more visually interesting than buying a standard size for every student. Tack the student artwork on the outside of the glass, not the inside, so that it is easy to change the student's art whenever they complete a new picture they are especially proud of. Children love pointing out their art to visitors or classmates.

For more information on these simple design projects, including photos of the displays, visit:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/public/424.cfm

To view a video excerpt of Boushey and Moser giving a classroom tour that demonstrates their redesign principles, visit:

http://www.choiceliteracy.com/products/item8.cfm

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