The Almost Organized Teacher: My Basic Organization Rules

One of my big goals for this year is to work on my organization skills. I am notorious for piling papers on various surfaces until I am no longer sure what still needs to be marked, what needs to be put away, what needs to be sent for printing, and what can be put in the recycle bin. This year I would like to improve on this and keep my desk and papers organized. In my few years of experience I have discovered what works and doesn't work for me and I would like to share a few basic rules I have discovered when it comes to staying organized and creating a system that works.

Organization Rule #1: Organization takes time and consistency.
No matter what system you may use to keep yourself organized it only works if you take the time to use it. For myself I am still trying to develop the habit of clearing off surfaces on a daily basis. In other words I need to take a few minutes every day and put everything away, whether it is supplies we used in Science, a homework assignment the students handed in today, or extra copies left over from the day's lessons. The big thing to remember is that moving clutter from a table to a teacher's desk doesn't count. This is a big thing for me to keep in mind as I am still working on defeating my tendency to simply pile stuff on my desk so I can ignore get to it later. So far I haven't managed to accomplish this completely every day and that is fine... creating new habits takes time. If I don't get to it every day I definitely make sure I take time on Friday afternoon to catch up and make sure everything is clear and ready to go for a new week.

This week was no exception. Here is a picture of my small group working table from Friday after school. Don't worry this pile wasn't there during the school day... I moved it off of my desk so I could get some work done.

 Before I left today I made sure to put everything back in its place and now both my desk and my small group table are ready for the students again on Monday. I am still working at making sure I devote the time and consistency needed to keep things organized but I can already see improvement from last year :)

Organization Rule #2: Put your spin on whatever system you decide to use.
I have spent a lot of time looking at other teacher's classrooms and marveling over their systems for staying organized. I'm the type of person who tends to find an idea and jump in with both feet before I really think things through. (Don't worry, I'm getting better at that too!) The result is I have tried a variety of different organization techniques in the past two years and they have all taught me one thing... just because it works for someone else doesn't mean it will work for me. Of course I encourage you to still look at what other teachers have done as there is no reason to re-invent the wheel and there are a lot of fantastic teachers out there who have been doing this a lot longer than I have. However you need to look at their systems and decide what parts of it may or may not work for you and make a system that works for you and your organizational needs. There is also some trial and error involved... at least that is the case for me.

Organization Rule #3: Be ready to change your system if needed.
As I said earlier, I have tried a few different systems for keeping myself organized. While I don't necessarily recommend changing your system completely, especially in the middle of the year (been there, done that, it doesn't work very well) you need to be ready to try different things if your system doesn't seem to be working. It takes a while to come up with a system for things that suits you and works within the demands of the job. Remember that you will get there! I'm pretty sure I have... I guess we'll have to wait and see.

In a future post I will go over some of the systems I am using for keeping myself organized this year. Don't expect them to be revolutionary, in fact most of them you will probably have seen before. Just in case you haven't though... stay tuned.