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Learning Environments

7 Teacher-Tested Hacks For Elementary Classrooms

Teachers post great ideas on Instagram for everything from keeping your room clean to getting kids moving. We鈥檝e collected a few, plus hashtags you should follow.

December 7, 2018

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Photo courtesy of Whitney Soboleski

Instagram is a great source of clever ideas and creative hacks for teachers. Two hashtags to follow are and 鈥攖hey鈥檙e attached to a lot of helpful, very doable ideas, like the seven here.

1. Turn Cleaning Up Into a Game

Fighting germs in the classroom is a never-ending chore, but you鈥檝e got plenty of help right in front of you鈥斺渕any hands make light work.鈥 Make a game of cleaning up by giving each student a wet wipe and having them scrub the tables and chairs as hard as they can. Give the one with the dirtiest wet wipe at the end of two minutes聽a small prize. Your classroom gets clean and the students have fun鈥攁 win-win. Tip courtesy of .

2. Germ-Proof Your Tissue Boxes

A teacher's classroom hack with under shelf storage for tissue boxes
Photo courtesy of Brooke Culton

Here鈥檚 another idea for keeping the classroom clean: Mount your tissue box under a shelf so that your students don鈥檛 have to handle the box get a tissue. To make this hack work, you鈥檒l need an under-the-shelf storage basket (, for example) and a pair of needle-nose pliers or wire cutters to cut a gap for the tissues. Pro tip: Shake the box well and the tissues will come out more easily. Now you just need to get the kids to actually use the tissues. Tip courtesy of .

3. Laminate Daily To-Do Lists

A lot of teachers use to-do lists to keep organized, and many of those lists include daily tasks that repeat week in, week out. If you have these kinds of repeating tasks, consider laminating your lists鈥攃heck out the image at the top of this story.聽You can make one list for each day of the week, for example. Include all of your repeating tasks, but also make room for any random tasks that pop up鈥攋ust use a dry-erase marker to add items. Tip and courtesy of .

4. Keep Flash Cards Organized With DIY Pockets

These pockets are handy for organizing flash cards of all kinds鈥攙ocabulary, math facts, etc. Even better, they鈥檙e cheap and easy to assemble. You鈥檒l need two laminating pouches for each pocket you make (one for each side of the folder). If you don鈥檛 have access to a laminator, you can use lightweight poly pockets () instead. Tip courtesy of .

5. Use Tap Lights to Help Manage Noise

A teacher's classroom voice level chart
Photo courtesy of Rachel Royster

Tap lights can help you manage the noise level in your classroom: After you鈥檝e discussed your expectations about voice levels for different activities鈥攕ilent for choice reading, for example鈥攗se the lights to remind students which level they should be using at any given time. The lights are pretty cheap: At the time of writing, you can buy a pack of four for $4 or $5. The lights can be heavy with batteries in them, so you may need to hot glue them to make them stick. You can adjust the number of lights to match the volume levels you use, and if you need more ideas to help your students get quiet, check out our article 鈥30 Techniques to Quiet a Noisy Class.鈥 Tip courtesy of .

6. Give Students a Brain Break

To give students a quick break without leaving your room, try a game聽called Switch. To play, students make two lines facing each other. The teacher calls out an activity, a hobby, or anything else the students may like to do or an item they may have. If the students like or have whatever it is, they switch sides. It鈥檚 an easy, engaging way to get students moving, and they get to know each other better too. Tip courtesy of .

7. Use Pictures on Turn-In Folders

A teacher's turn-in homework boxes
Photo courtesy of @thespedwardway

Here鈥檚 an idea built on to collect homework when students arrive in the morning鈥攁n idea shared by . Instead of putting tags with students鈥 names in the clear plastic tabs at the top of the folders, attach photos of them. Using their pictures is cute, and they鈥檒l have an easier time recognizing which folder is theirs鈥攅specially helpful in early grades or in special education settings. You may want to laminate the photos so they鈥檒l last longer. Photo tip courtesy of .

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Filed Under

  • Learning Environments
  • Pre-K
  • K-2 Primary
  • 3-5 Upper Elementary

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