How Do I Teach After School: School Set Up

Welcome to Day 2 of the How Do I Teach After School! Today I’m going to cover School Set Up. Be sure and read over Day 1: What To Teach.

Does your school set up have to look like a school room completely? No, I don’t think it does. Should you have a few things to help with your teaching? It would be helpful but not always needed. I want to show you what we have in the house. I will say that I got a lot of these items at the Target Dollar Section or One Stop as it is called now. I look for them over the year and grab them when I see them.

How much room do you have?

This is an important question. You are not teaching your kids full time. This is just after school and/or maybe full time summer school. Just what do you have space for? Will you have to use the room for more than one thing? How long will it take to set up what you do use? How long to put everything away?

I have limited space for this so I have to make sure the schooling stuff does not take over a room. A lot of what I use I make sure it can be folded up and moved away or stored easy. One example of this is our Word Wall. It is easy to change and folds up and can be put away. Currently I’m redoing it but here is what is currently on it.

You have to remember that everything takes up space. If you are only got to use it every now and then it will take up space. So where are you going to put it? Do you have space to keep it out all the time? What makes it easiest for you to get at it? Most of my activities can be put in a closet or behind something else to get it out of the way. For our work books and paper I store them on a shelf in the living room.

Figure out what you need

What we needed was not as complicated as full homeschooling but I do use a lot of those items. Often times you can forgo lots of complicated items and keep things simple. I keep their work in one area.

Here are some of the items we use for our after school set up.

• Folders for their work
• Bins with information
• Word Board or Word Wall
• Table
• Lap boards
• Pocket charts
• Dry Erase Board

After school set up does not have to be formal or complex. It has to be fun. This is learning at home! What we do at home should be fun and entertaining and maybe a different way to learning something they are already learning. Figuring out what will work for you might be a challenge at first but is worth it.

I hope you enjoyed day two of How Do I Teach After School: School Set Up!

Day 1: What To Teach
Day 3: Finding Materials
Day 4: Setting a Routine
Day 5: Scheduling the Year

Please keep in mind this post is my personal experience and might not work for your family. Keep in mind that you do what works best for you.

Cassie – 3Dinosaurs.com