Where I spend most (let's be real: all) my time...

I figured that I live spend so much time in my classroom that it only seemed appropriate to show you what it looks like.  I have a thing for primary colors...I really like them.  In my very first apartment, I had different primary colored pillows for our couches and we decorated in primary colors.  It only seems appropriate for me to incorporate that color scheme in my elementary classroom!

This is a picture of me standing in back of my desk looking out onto the room...it's definitely lacking in size...we're getting to know each other reeeeaaallly well in the cozy space!

This is a view from me standing in front of the door looking into the room. 

This is a view of the white board.  To the right is our calendar, jobs and mailboxes and to the left is the "Who Is Mrs. Corsi?" board (which will later be turned into the "Star Student of the Week" board).

To the right of the white board

To the left of the white board

Here is our sink area...this is where their lunches hang out (if they brought them from home) until lunch, where they switch out their dull/broken pencil for a sharpened one, and of course, where they wash their hands :)

Here's our "book nook" and the site of all of our morning meetings and number talk discussions...that rug sure does look big but my big 4th and 5th graders definitely don't all fit on it!

Here are our student computers as well as our Mastery Club board...if you're a teacher and you haven't checked out Mrs. Renz's website, you definitely need to give it a look!

And lastly, here is a view of our SMARTboard (I have a chart taped to it for this particular discussion) with our lone window to the right (my desk sits right in front of it).

It's so funny how the room looks so peaceful when it's empty.  It's definitely anything but peaceful during the day, although I feel as though I'm starting to figure out day by day a teeny-tiny bit more on how to survive in a split classroom.  For the longest time I couldn't get them to stop talking.  Like, seriously?  Why won't you stop talking???  I figured out something today that surprisingly worked really well: I started talking very quietly so they had to turn off their voices in order to hear mine.  I was pretty impressed with such a simple solution...I know I sound like such a debbie-downer when I say this, but I only give this solution a short amount of time before they decide they really don't care to hear what I'm saying!  If you're a teacher, do you have a great website resource that you recommend I check out for some great classroom ideas?

In other news...

Stephen and I close on our house tomorrow!  AHHHHH!!!!  We had our walk-through tonight and I snapped a ton of photos.  These will be great for me to look back on after we've worked in the house and made it more of our home.  I'll definitely share the pics here on my bloggity-blog as soon as I get a moment...expect them before next week is over :)