Classroom Cleanup

So - I decided to go into school today since our floors have been waxed and I got the A-OK to enter the building.  I walked into utter mess and wondered where in the world would I start?

Although, I was happy to see I'm still LOVIN' my new paint on the wall ~ including the stripe that I painted all the way around the room.  I love the color and it is so calming. (Hope it has the same effect on the kiddos.)  Anyway, I moved desks around, tried to organize and PURGE as much as I could and couldn't help but work on ONE bulletin board.  My theme is camping (and I'm adding owls this year) but I'm also in LOVE with polka dots - especially dots on chocolate.  I couldn't help using the big dots and border to create my reading strategies (word attack) board.  What do you think?

I also decided to splurge this year on a classroom rug.  (Mind you it is a factory second, but I still paid quite a bit of money for it - PLUS free shipping.)  It had arrived at school and I just couldn't wait to open it.  I am so in love with it... I FORGOT to take a picture but I'm going into school tomorrow and will take more pictures. Last year I put masking tape on my rug to make "spots" for my kiddos to sit... I bought a rug that has 30 squares (I have 24 first graders this year) so they will all have a square to sit in.  What I also adore is that is has the alphabet in the shape of animals on it - so I've already been thinking of ways to incorporate letters/sounds/relationships into our meeting times.  I have to giggle as I tell you this, but because it was such a major purchase and I love it so much, I had to try it out for myself.  N for Nicole and I sat in my square on the carpet.  Silly! I promise to take pictures tomorrow and I'd love to hear what you think about it. I also will post tomorrow about my new word wall letter headers and share those with you all.