The Present Teacher Podcast

5 Mistakes I Made Setting Up My Classroom During Back to School Season

• Helena Hains • Season 1 • Episode 98

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Ready to start preparing for back-to-school season without making common mistakes setting up your classroom?

In this podcast episode, I share all of the common mistakes I made when it came to setting up my classroom over the summer. We dive deep into how to set up your classroom with ease, without taking all summer, creating a classroom management plan, preparing for family night, and so much more. 

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//  ABOUT

I’m Helena, a coach for new and first-year teachers sharing knowledge on how to have a thriving career and personal life.

The Present Teacher Podcast is a resource for classroom management, classroom organization, time management, and teacher wellness. Follow along and learn how to thrive in the classroom and in life.

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Helena:

You're getting ready to set up your classroom and you're wondering what things should I make sure to set up for and what are some things I should definitely avoid setting up my classroom. Some mistakes I can avoid. Well, I'm happy to say, after five years of teaching, I have plenty of experience on things you should definitely set up and do for your classroom and some mistakes you could definitely avoid, and I'm gonna share all of the mistakes I've made from setting up my classroom over the past five years. If you don't know who I am, hi, my name is Helen. I'm the creator, the present teacher. I started teaching back in 2018 as a kindergarten teacher and then, three years later, I transitioned to a second grade teacher, and today I'm going to be sharing the five mistakes I made setting up my classroom during back to school season, and I'm going to tell you why they were a mistake and what you should do differently. So, with that being said, let's dive in. Hey, teacher bestie. My name is Helena and I'm the creator of the present teacher podcast. I'm a first year teacher coach and in this podcast, you are going to learn everything from simple, actionable classroom management, social learning and teacher wellness strategies. You know that impact you want to make in the classroom. We're going to make it happen here.

Helena:

The first mistake I made while setting up my classroom was I only focused on aesthetics, meaning. As soon as I graduated, or as soon as I got my teaching degree and my teaching position, the first thing I did was look up kindergarten themes or themes for kindergarten, themes for kindergarten classroom, and I spent weeks pinning all these amazing classrooms. I'd go onto Amazon and fill my wishlist of hundreds of dollars of you know cute decorations, and then I would go to the Dollar Tree and then I would start making my own decorations. My sweet then boyfriend, now husband of mine, actually made a glow from scratch because I did a travel theme. While it was very cool, my poor husband, that took a long, long time. I made hot air balloons. It was. It was a thing. Now, don't get me wrong. I personally love a themed room. For example, in second grade I had a Harry Potter themed classroom because my kids and I loved it so much. So I'm not dissing on an aesthetically pleasing classroom.

Helena:

However, the problem was over the school year. That's pretty much the only thing I focused on. I focused on how my classroom would look and maybe organizing a couple of things. Actually, I would organize things when I got there and that was it. The problem with that is what you will often find is when school starts, you'll realize, oh, I don't have a lot of time to prep. Oh, I don't know what I'm teaching. I guess I'll go on TPT and spend more money and try to come up with something last minute. So what I recommend doing is not only focus on aesthetics, but also focus on different items like your classroom management, parent communication, organization, planning and prepping and grading. I actually have content that I talked about this earlier in an earlier week. I'll make sure to link that in the description. But in general, the first mistake I made was I only focused on making my classroom look cute in the theme and in the long. When I started teaching, I was extremely overwhelmed because I had nothing else prepared. So dedicating some time to make a cute classroom but also to focus on other aspects is going to be really, really important. The second mistake I made while setting up my classroom is I bought everything I needed before seeing my classroom.

Helena:

Now, a little bit of a backstory I graduated in 2018 with my master's in elementary education from Eastern Oregon University, so I was moving from Oregon to New Mexico to a small town called Pecos, and I was super nervous, super excited. So I bought all the things I could possibly need, or I thought I could possibly need or I thought I could possibly need for my classroom. This included books, paper, scissors and like everything and everything. The problem was I moved all that. I bought all that stuff and, don't get me wrong, a lot of my family members helped too but I got all that stuff. I moved it across the country. I came into my classroom only to find there were five cabinets full of books in the level I needed, and there were not one, not two, but three cabinets full of colored paper. Now, I'm not complaining in the slightest. However, had I waited to look at my classroom first before buying all that stuff, I would have known, instead of designating those funds to those resources, I could have designated it to something else that I was missing in my classroom, which is why I recommend you look at your classroom first before you buy a bunch of stuff. Now am I saying don't buy your favorite books, by all means. You know if you have favorites and absolutely wants or needs that, you're okay with possibly having a duplicate in your classroom, but you want your own personal version or a personal one, feel free to get ahead of time. But before you spend hundreds or even thousands of dollars on a classroom, take some time to get a good inventory of what is in your classroom first, so you're not spending money on resources that you already have access to and instead you can designate them to something else.

Helena:

The third mistake I made while setting up my classroom for the school year was I didn't plan out the first week of school Now. At the time I did not know this, but when I went on the district calendar, I was told teachers will start by this date and then the students will be here by this date, and there was like about a week in between and I'm thinking perfect, I will use that time to plan out what I need for the school year during that week. However, I did not know that that week was spent primarily on meetings, and when I moved a couple of years later to second grade at a different district, the same thing. That time before students get there are mostly set up for meetings and the district has their own expectations that they have to follow every year and certain trainings that they need you to take every year. That's when they do a majority of those trainings. So I didn't plan out my first week and what I found was I was staying late after these meetings. I was working into the weekend, the weekend before, trying to get ready for the first week of school. That's why I recommend taking some time over the summer Now I'm not saying weeks and weeks on end, but even a day to plan out what you're teaching during the first week of school. That's going to help you in the long run because when you come in during that one week teachers that are given the week before school starts, or however many days your classroom is all set up and you already have the things you need, because you already looked at what you have and then you went ahead and bought what you were missing and then you also already planned out the first week of school. So you can walk in that much more ahead and that much more ease, because you're gonna probably be learning a lot of different things, because every district is different. They have different ways of doing things and you can really spend that week getting to know people and just getting to know all the expectations in the school district.

Helena:

As a quick recap of all the mistakes I've made setting up my classroom over the summer is the first one is I only focused on aesthetics, aka making my classroom look cute or matching the theme. The second thing is I botched everything I needed before seeing what was in my classroom beforehand. The third thing is I didn't plan out the first week in advance, so when I came in expecting to have time to do that, I actually didn't have that much time to do that, so I was behind before the school year even started. The next mistake I made when it came to setting up my classroom over the summer is I didn't focus on classroom management. Now, I did have a quick preface. I did have student teaching experience for my master's degree that entire year.

Helena:

Those 10 months I was in that program, I was required to be in student teaching at two different placements, and then for my bachelor's degree that I finished in three years, I was required for two of those years to do placements throughout my time there. However, my mentor teachers just came in knowing how they were going to manage their classroom. I never got to see that planning piece that they were doing the summer before, and so I had no idea that I should be doing that, which meant when my students came in, I didn't know what content to teach. I didn't know how to model what I expected of them. What happened was I kind of went over the rules briefly, but then my students felt. I felt like my students were never listening to me from day one and that's because I didn't have a clear classroom management plan. I would often give them multiple warnings. I would look up strategies on social media or Pinterest and I would use those strategies, like Burt Beans, desk Pets, everything that was trending Clipcharts at the time and what I realized was none of it was aligned to me and none of it was working, because I didn't have a strong classroom management from the get-go.

Helena:

Think of classroom management as like the cake, the actual cake part, and then those positive strategies you see online. Those are like the frosting, the positive reinforcement. You need the cake first, otherwise your cake is going to be flat and not actually a cake. That's what happened during my first couple years of teaching, which is why I recommend you focus on classroom management ahead of time. Now, I've talked about this in a previous week. I'll go ahead and link it as well, but in general, I recommend focusing on building relationships. How are you going to connect with students? How are you going to help them build relationships with each other After relationships? You also want to have clear expectations and procedures. How do you want students to interact with the different items, each other and throughout the room? What are the expectations of that? What does it look like and sound like? Focus on those during the first week of school. They'll save you so much time. What are the rules that you teach or that you're using in the classroom? Are they positive? Do they model what it should look like and sound like in the classroom? Are they positive? Do they model what it should look like and sound like in the classroom? What are the consequences? Are you giving people 10, 20, 30 warnings before you take action, or do you have step one? Is this step two? Is this step three? Is this step four? Is this Now a common misconception?

Helena:

I want to explain to you and I know it's kind of hard to kind of get the gist of that based off of just you know, me being here, but I'm kind of an up engaging, fast paced, fun, bubbly teacher, even though personally I'm actually quite reserved and an introvert. Besides the point, you can have high expectations with your classroom management. So your students you can have high expectations with your classroom management. So your students behave well and they behave with excellence and academically they are strong and still be the fun, bubbly, engaging teacher. Trust me, I was told from the get-go that I was going to be a terrible teacher because I was engaging and fun and my students would walk all over me. That is not the case. You can have high expectations and have students practice until they reach your expectations while still being fun. It's not mean. Kids love structure and when you have structure, you have more freedom to be the goofy, lovable, unique you and let your teaching style go.

Helena:

So just a quick caveat with that, make sure you focus on your classroom management, make sure you focus on those things I talked about earlier and with that as kind of a side note, I just feel kind of led to share it. You're going to find a lot of strategies online. I know it's very different to the world we live in from 2018 when I started, but here's the deal. You need to get clear on what values are true to you. What kind of teacher do you want to be? Are you going to be the positive, bubbly, engaging one? Are you going to be the reserved and, you know, sarcastic? What is your personality? What kind of classroom do you want to be in? And then, while you're taking in different content online, think to yourself is this aligned with my values? That would have saved me so much time had I not.

Helena:

I saw resources online about classroom management, like the Blurt Beans or the Clip Chart, that when I looked at them I thought I don't know, that doesn't feel right. But if it's working for them, I'm going to try it. There's a reason I was kind of hesitant about it. It's because it wasn't aligned with my energy. The clip chart when I used it, my students would dysregulate and have a hard time coming back once I ever had them clipped down, and that's why I don't do clip charts anymore.

Helena:

My second year, I got rid of it and I tried something else, because I don't feel like a student's overall day is a reflection of them needing a sideline conversation. Instead, I laid out exactly how I'm going to respond proactively, respond to disruptive behavior to get my students back on track and work together as a team to get them there. So, with all that being said, whether it's me, whether it's another teacher online, whether it's on Instagram, tiktok, youtube, podcasting whenever you hear a strategy, make sure to ask yourself what are my values? Is this aligned with me? If someone gives you a strategy that doesn't feel aligned with you, don't do it. Just don't do it because you know yourself best. I know that was a tangent I felt like, honestly, it's really good advice that I wish I got sooner.

Helena:

So, anyways, the mistakes I've made setting up my classroom. The first one is I only focused on aesthetics. The second one I bought everything I needed before seeing my classroom. The third one I didn't plan out my first week and struggled and paid for it later. The fourth thing I didn't focus on my classroom management. So from the get-go, my students weren't listening to me and I couldn't figure out why. The fifth one is I didn't focus on clear communication. Now, parent night approached and I was frantically asking teachers going on to TPT, researching all I could on how I wanted to prepare for parent night, and it was extremely stressful. Instead, take some time ahead of time to think about what are you going to do for parent night, how are you going to be consistent with your communication with your families? And then, third, how are you going to have a positive relationship with your families?

Helena:

Because here's a mistake I made is I only reached out to my families during the first year of school. Occasionally, I use Class Dojo. Occasionally I would send them a picture of their students working. A majority of the time, I reached out to them to let them know when we had an activity, when it was a field trip or when something happened at school that I needed their help with. The problem with this is it's kind of like a relationship. If you and I were friends and I only reached out to you and I needed something from you, you would feel a draining energy and you wouldn't want to be friends with me, because it's not a give and take, it's not a positive relationship. I'm constantly taking from you. Now, if you're doing this, I don't want you to feel guilty. Like I said, I did this my first couple years of teaching and I learned better, so I do better and I bring it to your attention now. So instead, what I do is I focus on having positive relationships with my families and I talk about doing this a couple different ways. Feel free to look at my previous weeks because I've definitely talked about this in depth.

Helena:

Quick overview, though Positive communication I'm reaching out to my family to let them know one positive thing about them every single month, or once a quarter at least, that I noticed about their students. They did great on this. They made a great friend with this. They had a great idea when we asked about this. That way I'm showing I'm here not only to help support during the hard times, I'm here to celebrate the good times and it makes my family that much more of a give and take and they're that much more likely to help support me because it's a give and take relationship there.

Helena:

And the second thing is consistent communication. I'm making sure that I send them weekly newsletters. You don't have to do weekly if that feels draining to you or, like I said earlier, if that's not aligned to you, don't do it. You know you can start off with monthly updates, semi-weekly, whatever feels best for you. But making sure my families were in the loop. That way I didn't get any. I didn't hear about that field trip. I could be like here's all the newsletters that I mentioned it and I actually just uploaded the PDF version on Dojo every Monday when I sent it home. That way, they had a digital version and a paper version. So I always said you know, I knew exactly what was coming up for them. So those are the things that I recommend doing.

Helena:

And another thing I like to do is I like to work on making sure we're a team. So whenever I'm talking to them about a concern, I talk about how we can work together, how we can help that student. That'll help bring them into the positive and help build that relationship and help show that you're on their side. You want what's best for their child. Because you do, you're a genuine human being who cares for them and you can work together to get there and you're willing to hear their thoughts so we can contribute together and make this a successful place for your student.

Helena:

Okay, so that was another mistake I made and I learned from years of experience the hard way. The next thing I learned is I didn't organize my resources. The next thing I learned is I didn't organize my resources. Honestly, after I set up my cute classroom and, if I'm being 100% honest, my first, second and third year, I didn't actually care about how my resources were set up in my classroom my manipulatives, my extra materials. Here's how that showed up in my classroom. What would happen was, when students were working, say they need another crayon, they would walk all the way over here to grab the crayon and then they sit down. Well, then their pencil broke and then they'd walk all the way over here to grab a pencil and since or they turn something in and they walk all the way over here and then turn it in, meanwhile being primary students and just students and you know social human beings they would talk to their friends as they were going, and now I have 20, 22, 27 of them doing that.

Helena:

It's no wonder I had so many disruptive behaviors. Instead, if you're intentional about your resource area, you have a majority of the resources your students will need in one spot so they can go, and you practice that procedure. When it looks like sounds like to get there and come back, you're minimizing behavior. Once I learned this, it is honestly like some of the smallest things that you don't think can aid disruptive behavior does. So being intentional about that, organizing your resources in the one area that makes sense and showing what it looks like and sounds like to get those resources, is going to help you in the long run. It also helped me because I would go to the store thinking I didn't have any more materials and, lo and behold, in one of my drawers that was randomly crammed full of supplies. They were there and I could have saved a lot of money that way. So don't recommend doing that. I recommend taking some time and organizing your resources ahead of time.

Helena:

Now, supplies aside, I can't help but die as I think about this Paper resources and digital resources. I can't tell you how many times I went to the search bar on TPT of my resources to see what I had already bought because I didn't have a good system. And I can't tell you how many times I would rebuy something that I already had a different version of because I didn't know I had it, that I already had a different version of because I didn't know I had it. I can't tell you how many times those first two, three years I had a stack like this of papers to file that I just kept adding to because I never had time to make the folders for them. I can't tell you how many times I had to sift through my downloads spot on my desktop looking for resources. Okay, here's the deal. If you do this, it's gonna feel like you're working harder and harder and harder each year. It's never gonna feel like you've got the hang of things because you're always searching for the same things. So over the summer, here's what I recommend doing Set up your vanilla folders ahead of time.

Helena:

Look at your curriculum, look at your standards here's all the grade levels I'm teaching, here's all the subjects I'm taking, here's all the skills I'm teaching and put vanilla folders there. That way, when you have a paper and you've printed it out, you just file it right away. Right away. You already have a folder. You don't have to put it in the file bin because you haven't made a folder for it. And then, if you don't have a folder for it, put a marker with the vanilla folder on the front, clip it together. That way you can just jot it down really fast and file it.

Helena:

Doing this ahead of time will save you years of stress On your desktop. Make folders, the same folders that you made a paper version of. Do a digital version. It's gonna help you so much time. Please do that. Trust me, we're going to thank me for that. So make sure you're organizing your resources because when you have it set up once, you can go back and look at what you already have, and sure you're gonna add resources, because when you have it set up once you can go back and look at what you already have, and sure you're going to add as you go. But adding and tweaking is a lot easier than starting. I'm going to say that again, adding and tweaking what you already have is a lot easier than starting. So start now, start right. Please don't make that same mistake I did. And if you already have no worries, now's a great time to start that, all right.

Helena:

So the last and final mistake I made was I put up my different areas of my classroom without considering the flows of the classroom. Now, you may have noticed I'm a bit of a classroom management well, I wouldn't say guru. I've learned from my mistakes and I'm not ashamed to share them with you so you don't make the same mistakes. And I've learned from trial and error, because teaching is one big experiment. So here's the deal when you put different areas in your classroom does matter, and sure you can look at what your mentor teacher did, the other teacher did and copy. But if they're not taking into consideration the flow of the classroom, then how do you expect to minimize disruptive behavior, nor you don't know better. So here's what I mean.

Helena:

My first year of teaching I had this super cute classroom library with a canopy. Until I found out that I was allowed to have a canopy because it was a certain height and the students pulled it down. I had to take it down. Side note like don't do that. Or, you know, teach procedures better than I did, because I did not. Regardless, I have a library next to the lineup area and what happened was whenever a student came in late, came in early, whatever, my students that were quietly working at the library and reading with me or reading or reading with a teacher's assistant were then disrupted by that student.

Helena:

Being intentional with which areas you set up next to each other is very important. I also had my small group area where I pulled students back for intervention or for small group work by the lineup area and then I'd get upset when students would come in late, or teachers came in for a quick question they would see me there and they would come in and ask me for something, or students would come in late and families would see me and they'd want to chit chat while I was teaching. Be intentional of the flow of your classroom, you'll learn that some areas work well and some areas don't. Now, if you feel a little intimidated, you're like well then I don't know what areas to work put next to each other If you make. I want to give you this reminder If you set up areas that don't work well together, what's the worst case scenario?

Helena:

You find out it doesn't work and you move it like I mean I can dive really deep. I don't know if I've covered this yet, but I could dive deep into which areas I do recommend and don't recommend next to each other. However, think about okay, what areas are next to this? What's the flow in my classroom? Is this going to be disruptive to other students? And think about that. It doesn't have to be perfect. Teaching is one big experiment. The reason I'm sharing all these lessons with you is because I made mistakes. Mistakes are just a way to get closer to having a smoother ride. So, with that being said, consider the flow of your classroom and which areas you're putting next to each other, because it may be adding to disruptive behavior happening and distracting students. So those are all the mistakes that I can think of that I've made setting up my classroom.

Helena:

As a quick recap. The first one was I only focused on aesthetics or making a themed or cute classroom. The second one was I bought everything I thought I needed before seeing the actual classroom. The third one was I didn't plan out the first week ahead of time. And the fourth one was I didn't focus on classroom management, so when my students came in, I was having a hard time managing behaviors. That's because I didn't start off strong from the get-go. The fifth one is I didn't focus on clear communication and consistent communication with my families. The sixth one is I didn't organize my resources ahead of time, which in turn turned to more disruptive behavior. And seven, I put up my areas without considering the flow of the classroom, which again led to more disruptive behaviors.

Helena:

All in all, if you do these intentionally, and even if you make mistakes because clearly I've made plenty of them it'll help you become a better teacher. Each year, you learn stuff that works well and that didn't work well, and you learn better. So, with all that being said, those are the mistakes I've made. I'm happy and kind of curious. What kind of mistakes did you make? I'd be curious. Let me know. And then, with all that being said, if you wanna learn all my tips and strategies and the common questions I get asked about setting up your classroom for success, I recommend downloading the Ultimate Classroom Setup Guide. This is a free guide. I put the compiled all the questions and top tips I have for setting up your classroom in one single space. So my gift to you. Feel free to make sure to download that. I'll put a link in the description down below. I know when I started I was sifting through so many different resources and I wish I just would have had one spot that answered all my questions, because it would have saved me a lot of time.

Helena:

The second thing I want to invite you to do, if you want to dive deeper into this and you want me to teach you how to set up everything I talked about previously in not take your entire summer, because I don't like working on my summers. I found a way to set up my classroom in four weeks with everything we just mentioned. I would love to invite you to join us inside the classroom kick Kickstart mini course. Now, this is a course that I typically do, or a program or a resource that I do have open enrollment year round. However, during the summer it's special because I do a live cohort, meaning you get extra support from me and other people going through the course at the same time when you join during the summer. So if you want to join this summer I'm only doing it once a summer this cohort I highly recommend you get on the waitlist for that classroom kickstart. Download below. I'll put the link down below. The reason I recommend getting on the waitlist is because if you're on my waitlist you may get a heads up ahead of time, meaning you get first dibs on the slots. Meaning you also get paper for being the first ones to join. So if you want to join us, make sure to go ahead and join us and get on the waitlist in the description down below. I'd be happy to see you.

Helena:

What questions do you have about setting up your classroom?

Helena:

I would love to hear more about what questions you have. With all that being said, just know it's going to be okay. I know it can be overwhelming. I know there's a lot of content. I know there's a lot to take in. Just know, take one inspired step after another. You can do this.

Helena:

If I can do this, you can do this.

Helena:

If the teacher next door can do this.

Helena:

You can do this. We all started in the exact same place. You got this. You are going to get better and better. It's going to get easier and easier each year that you do this. I believe in you a hundred percent. You are doing an amazing job. You are not behind. You are exactly where you need to be. All right, teacher bestie, I love you and, as always, remember we are stronger together and I will see you in the next one. Teacher Bestie, bye. Thank you so much for joining me on today's episode. I hope that you were able to take away some value that will help you thrive inside and out of the classroom. It would mean the world to me if you could take five seconds right now and leave a review on this podcast. And if you found this podcast especially helpful, make sure to take a screenshot of this episode right now and tag me on your socials to let me know you're listening. As always, remember that we are stronger together. With all the love in the world. Helena, aka the Present Teacher. See you next time, teacher Bestie.

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