Environment as Third Teacher

In the quest for education rigor, academic performance and high stakes testing, the educational environment is easy to forget.

I'm talking about the actual brick and mortar building.

The classrooms, the playgrounds, the hallways, the bathrooms.

All of it.

Sure, it has to be safe. Everyone is aware of that.

No one (or at least I'm not) is going to send their kids to a school like the one in Matilda!

But if we want to reach students and help them to achieve all that they can be. Or let's face it, to just ENJOY the journey, we have to stop and ask what their daily environment looks like.

I really, really appreciate the Reggio Emilia approach of Environment as the Third Teacher. Interested in learning more? Click here is a fantastic pdf article on our teaching environments. What I see in this approach, besides acknowledging that the environment we live in is important, is that it levels the playing field a little between teachers and auxiliary staff members.

In fact, I bet the custodial team at my campus has never been given articles on environment and how all team members are CRUCIAL for successful schools. Sure, people are quick to stop these hard workers when something isn't done, but when was the last time I stopped Lilly as she is organizing the cafeteria and told her thank you and that she MATTERS! Shame on me.

So what am I going to do?

Well, I'm going to start by saying thank you and telling our maintenance/custodial team that they matter. Then I'm going to work on changing MY environment. A really good article on creating quality environments is "How the Environment Inspires Curriculum." 


And then I'm going to...

1. De-clutter. I'm going to look for and get rid of "unintenional knick-knacks."  (man just typing that and looking around my dining table, I'm like oh man. How about the Easter basket that is on my china cabinet? It's July. Talk about an "unintentional knick-knack")

2. Walk around the room/building and ask "What is the purpose of ___?"

3. Remember that the environment needs to be balanced. If I break the room into sections, have I balanced the space or will all of the students be forced into one area so that I can create a cool space that looks fun but rarely used. The idea of taking a section and placing it on a mental scale has me rethinking sections of my classroom. I have a ton of space designated for rarely used stuff, but for every day life with students, we end up crowded.

4. Create more FOOT space than SHELF space. (Boy this another ouch for me. I have shelves, shelves and more shelves. Both at home and at school.  I really need to get rid of some of my junk to make room for life!)

And once I've done that. I'm going to stop and brainstorm about the places that I like spending time in. And figure out what I can do to bring that about into my daily environment.

Here are a few of my favorite places.. these are just representative pics from google. I haven't necessarily been to Starbucks on at Downtown Disney. :)

 

So what do I notice about these places.. I love the contrast between light and dark. I love the different textures. I love the see-thru containers.

Stopping and brainstorming about my teaching (living) environment is pretty fun. I would have said that the lack of windows to the outside world was the hardest thing for me to overcome. But after some visual brainstorming, I have so many ideas! And ideas that I can implement! I can't cut a hole in my cinder block wall and put in a window for my classroom. But I can add contrast and texture!

This is where I am starting.  These are pictures from my classroom at the start of school last year.  It's pretty much the same.. maybe even less cluttered right now!

First up. Moving the big front table from the dominate position in the classroom. We use it primarily for holding supplies. So why does it get soo much space?? If I move the monster table to take up some wall space, I can open up a large section of the classroom for feet space. This would really help the traffic jam of students trying to get in and out from their tables.

And the half painted wall of cabinets? It bothers me, but I got used to them. Like we all do. We get complacent in our daily life. I'm not sure what color they will be painted, but something for contrast!

And that's one of the best things about summer. It's a time to rejuvenate our minds and bodies AND our environments!! Because I want my environment as the third teacher to be a ROCKSTAR.. not a teacher in need of assistance plan! ;)

40 Bags in 40 Days 2015

Years ago I completed my first 40 bags in 40 days challenge. It was amazing.  I was SHOCKED at how many bags of junk and clutter that I filled and easily got rid of. 

This year, I'm starting late to do the 40 bags over the 40 days of Lent, but ANYTIME can be a great time to declutter our lives.  We don’t have to wait for Lent to be mindful.. or spring cleaning to sort.. or summer to slash.. or the looming holdiays to finally clean things out from the previous year.. 

We just need to START!

So here is my handy chart.  I've saved it as a JPEG so that you can save it and use it too.

Good LUCK! 

And did you notice that I didn't put dates on it?  Just Day 1 and so forth.. so NO PRESSURE and NO GUILT! So what if it takes you all year to get the 40 days of decluttering complete.. that's at least 40 bags more than you would have otherwise!!

Won't you join me? I'm starting today.. And I'm going to start with my craft stuff. OUCH!

40 Bags in 40 Days Update

40 Bags in 40 Days for Lent.  In case you missed my initail post, click here for the background.

Otherwise, here is an update.

As you saw in a previous post, I got the laundry room finished. Yeah! It's so useable and clutter-free. I was even able to fold laundry on the counter! Amazing how wonderful it feels to have a clean and easy to navigate space.

From there, I cleaned out my closest and dresser. I'm not much on having excess clothing, so I just got rid of a bag from each.

Next up was the section of the kitchen that works as an office/china cabinet type area.  In the picture below, it looks almost clean. In reality it is a junk storage area!

From this area, I got rid of a couple of boxes of just random junk, old computer software and a lot of trash! 

The hardest part so far was going through my recipe boxes. I got rid of three of the four boxes. In the past, I was one that would cut out interesting recipes and glue them on notecards for future use.  I had hundreds of cards. But today, if I need a recipe, I just google it and go. So, no need to keep them, just to keep them. I did keep the recipe's that I use or that I have from my grandmother, but so long, never used recipe for some exotic concoction.

Today, I sorted clothes. I got rid of at least three boxes worth of kid clothes plus a large box of my own out of season clothing.

In addition to all this, we've gotten rid of TWO TRUCK LOADS of stuff from the garage!! This alone counts for probably 50 bags!

Doug mentioned that at somepoint I'll have to stop getting rid of stuff, but for now, we are both loving the 40 days of cleaning out the house!!

40 Bags in 40 Days: Day One, The Laundry Room

In case you are wondering... I started early. I know that I'll get behind quickly, but I had a relatively free evening and decided to get a head start!

When I made my 40 Bags list, I wasn't thinking about how much WORK it was going to be to clean up the laundry room. I just knew it needed to happen.

UGH!!

I started with things looking like this.

 I finished with this!! OH YEAH!! SWEET!!

But getting there took a while. I cleaned out a couple of bags worth of fabric scraps, craft junk and a pile of trash. 

Look at that monster Ikea bag full of goodies that are leaving my house!!

 And here it is. The clean and de-cluttered laundry room!!



Let's take one more look at the organized thread...

I repurposed a ribbon organizer that never seemed to really work. I love it in this use.

Yippee for organization, repurposing and decluttering!!

40 Bags in 40 Days

What are you giving up for Lent?  It's a common question this time of the year as Ash Wednesday is this Wednesday!  This year, I'm not giving anything up. Well, not any one thing.  Some years I've given up chocolate, some sugar, some caffeine and so forth.  But this year, with life and kids and stress, I decided that giving up one thing was just going to add to the stress level and I didn't need that.

So, instead, I'm doing 40 Bags in 40 Days.

Google it and you can read a dozen or more articles/blogs about it, so I'm not going to list just one for you.

The idea is that during Lent, you use the 40 days to refocus your life and declutter your home.  I like that. A LOT!

You would think that after moving twice this last year that we would be clutter free. We aren't. I look around the house and the amount of stuff that we don't use is staggering. So... 40 bags, oh yeah. Now, I'm not planning on emptying the house of our worthwhile keepsakes and things we use everyday, but I KNOW that we can come up with at least a grocery size bag of stuff from every corner of our house.

Here is my list:

And here is my challenge to me, that while I am cleaning out rooms/closets and drawers, that I declutter mindfully. That I ask myself to be honest about if we use something and that if we don't, we send it to a new home with grateful hearts.

Because Lent is a time of preparing our hearts for Easter. It's a time to focus on the gift/sacrifice that Jesus gave us. It's a time to declutter our bodies and to be mindful of the gifts God has given us. So this year, I'm not giving up sweet tea for Lent. I'm going to purposefully and prayerfully focus on our home.