I have been really struggling with how to set up our school room in a way that would stop the little boys from causing big messes every time they would go down to play. We have changed our room around 2 different times both ways just not working good for us. So this time I decided that I needed to really think about what was causing us so many probles with our previous designs… What I came up with was to put as much of my school stuff back onto storage shelves or some where the little ones cannot get into it.
To solve this problem I needed more shelves, so I had Jake build me 2 big shelving units back in our laundry area, 1 shelf for the closet in the school room, and then put some metal shelves we had in the garage from Ikea into our back as we call it “cold storage area.” Which made it possible to move just about everything out of the reach of little ones 🙂 and really clear up our room!
Here is an overview of the other side. |
This is our first shelf with some of our books, I am still working on making printable labels for the front of the bins so we can find the books easy. Most of our books have been purchased at the thrift store for $.10-$.25 or from the Scholastic Book Clubs orders for really cheap. I found this wonderful idea for storing books from Carissa over at 1+1+1=1.
Our Ikea shelf has now been organized with more books.
- Top Shelf
- Starting on the top shelf on the left is our Worndurful World of Disney encyclopedias,
- next over are our reference books, next cubby over is our USA books and a basket of USA puzzles and flash cards,
- the last cubby on the top is my binders with my Letter Of The Week Curriculum and Montessori Manuals.
- The Second Shelf Down
- Starting at the left is our collection of Highlight Magazines on top is our Boxcar Children books,
- The next cubby over is our Sugar Creek Gang books, and our Junie B Jones books,
- Next cubby over is our Magic Tree House Books, and Now and Then Heroes books,
- The last cubby over has a binder with my Homeschool Binder and a basket of Beverly Cleary books.
- The third shelf down
- Starting at the left side we have some of our country books, and a basket of Christmas chapter books (which gets changed out during the seasons)
- next to that is a basket of seasonal Board books that Gabe can take off whenever he wants to read books with us.
- the next basket contains seasonal books of whatever picture books are not upstairs for bedtime stories. As you can see this picture was taken at Christmas when we had some of our Christmas Picture books out.
- The last cubby contains a basket with the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew books, and a photo album.
- The bottom Shelf
- Most of the bottom contains our Encyclopedia set,
- the last cubby also contains a basket with all of our National Geographic magazines.
I am hoping that this will make the books easier to find for the kids and make things easier to find when they need to be put away. In front of the shelves on the floor, I have a basket with some coloring books in it the little boys like to pull these out during school and color.
This is the 1 shelf that is being kept in the room for Montessori materials, and a few other activities the little boys are working on. Back behind that shelf is our Calendar area and a desk for someone to work at.
The empty spot on the wall is where our Ikea Table will go for Ethan’s desk, we have some Ikea containers above where his desk will be so he can store his crayons, scissors, etc close by.
These shelves hold our extra crayons, glue, paintbrushes, notecards, etc.. So the things that are needed frequently are close by.
Now onto the new storage.
The second shelf down has our books, teachers editions, extra paper & notebooks, our trays, a basket with crayons, HWOT Wooden letters and magnet pieces, and a couple containers with misc items in them and a few other items that are used regularly in our class.
The bottom shelf has some of our games, flash cards and a couple bins of items used pretty frequently.
The bottom is where all my books I need to put into their proper themed magazine box. Since this picture they have all been stored away into their proper magazine boxes.
This is the second shelf he built, this one is a lot bigger than the other shelf. I have 2 sizes of boys shoes all stored in a smaller tote. Winter boots and snow stuff are in the big totes on the top shelf, along with some trays, and misc items.
Misc school stuff is stored on the bigger shelves, extra trays, puzzles, themed storage, halloween costumes, and more.
Wow, that looks like a great school room. I am in the process of finishing up our schooling space as well. I love organization. I’m sure the kids will really enjoy that space 🙂
Don’t you love the Ikea shelves? We just bought ours and they have worked perfectly to help us stay organized. Blessings for a great year!
Great job! Isn’t is wonderful to have a handyman in the house? Hope you have a great new school year. 🙂
Wow! You have so many resources. It is enough to make one drool LOL! I love the sensory room. I wish we had one of those..
Blessings, Dawn
Really nice space. I love your book organization.
Wonderful space!! Love all of those shelves. And how nice to have such a handy hubby.
Popping in from the blog hop.