TOOLBOX MADE PRETTY (teaching without a desk)

Last year, I did away with my (huge, bulky) teacher desk. I read Debbie Diller's Spaces and Places in anticipation of organizing and designing my brand new (to me) classroom.

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Ms. Diller suggested eliminating teacher desks, as they take up valuable classroom space and promote clutter. I completely agreed. I hardly used my desk, except as a dumping grounds for papers and books to look at later. I could neatly stack them daily, but the fact was, my desk was cluttered.

I removed my desk and used my small group table instead. I kept it clean, since it's where I did most of my teaching through the day. I loved it! The only problem was that I didn't have a place to store my supplies since I no longer had drawers. I used shelves behind my table with baskets and containers. It worked for last year, but took up a lot of room, the containers often spilled, and it just wasn't as organized as I had wanted it to be.

Somewhere in the midst of hundreds of teaching blogs in my Google Reader, I stumbled upon this and this:

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Obviously I had to make one of my own! Christopher and I found the toolbox at Lowe's ($16) and I spent less than an hour making it fixing it up.

Here she is in her (very!) temporary home in my classroom:

If only my entire classroom could be as neat and organized as this little box!