It’s been a while since I wrote an “Organize Your…” post!  I realized during center time yesterday that I never blogged about how I keep my centers organized, so now sounds good to me 🙂

I split my class up into five groups: Giraffes, Elephants, Zebras, Lions, and Tigers.  They are grouped according to skill level.  The Tigers are my resource kiddos, and they work on the Wilson’s program with the resource teacher during center time.  Here’s a picture of my work board:
We have four centers that we complete weekly: writing, word work {this week it’s Rainbow Write}, math, and buddy reading.  We complete those centers M-Th.  For each of the centers, I pull activities from either Treasures {our reading series}, or from the fun packs my bloggy friends make 🙂  In February, I’ll start pulling centers from my oh so sweet pack!  On Friday, my centers are Teacher’s Choice.  I like to do holiday/themed centers on Fridays to shake things up a bit 🙂 

I assign each group a center captain, who is responsible for gathering the materials for center work.  I keep the supplies in baskets {which are kept in cubbies}.  I have a bunch of baskets ready to go so I can switch them out from week to week, as necessary.  Here’s a pic of one of the baskets:
There is a clothespin on the front of the basket holding a pic of the giraffe… so the Giraffes know that this is their basket for the day.  I rotate the pictures daily.  Inside this basket are all the supplies for this particular center:
*pencil bucket
*dice in little containers {to prevent them from flying everywhere}
*crayons in a slider case
*Rainbow Roll-n-Write directions
*folder with recording sheet & word lists:
My kiddos are pretty much pros at center time.  It took them a few months and a lot of practice, but now they know exactly where to go, what baskets to grab, and where to put them back.  I love a good routine!
How do you organize your centers?

Similar Posts

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *