This school year has started out in a sprint!!! I am teaching 3rd-4th grade this year and I have a wonderful group of 30 students to meet me each morning! They are funny and eager to learn and I know that this year will be great! One thing I have done differently this year is the way I organize the pencils!
Every year I struggled to keep sharp pencils in the hands of my students! I have tried pencil cans on each table, using a pencil sharpening assistant and, in the upper grades, making each student be responsible for getting his or her own pencils ready for the day....but all of those strategies have failed and left me feeling frustrated and annoyed because, without fail, someone was always left without a sharp pencil right when they needed it!!
Well, this year, I have a new system!!! And so far I LOVE it!!!!
I bought a straw dispenser online, decorated it with cute paper and...voila!
Every year I struggled to keep sharp pencils in the hands of my students! I have tried pencil cans on each table, using a pencil sharpening assistant and, in the upper grades, making each student be responsible for getting his or her own pencils ready for the day....but all of those strategies have failed and left me feeling frustrated and annoyed because, without fail, someone was always left without a sharp pencil right when they needed it!!
Well, this year, I have a new system!!! And so far I LOVE it!!!!
I bought a straw dispenser online, decorated it with cute paper and...voila!
One turn of the little crank and a sharp pencil appears! I also added a cute eraser jar....
And the pencil sharpening system is complete!
I told each student to keep 2-3 pencils in their pencil box. When a pencil breaks, they have extras at their desk. When all the pencils are ready to be sharpened, they exchange however many they need with new sharp ones! At the end of the day, I have all the need-to-be-sharpened pencils in the pink can right next to my high-powered sharpener (not for student use) so I can get them all sharpened in about 5 minutes!
A few kinks to work out:
1. Sometimes the pencils get stuck in the dispenser. To unstick them, just push up from the bottom. Or turn the crank the other way to dislodge the jam. Also the rule is that the students must remove the cute erasers from the pencils that need to be sharpened. (This also helped solve the problem of students getting into that eraser jar 10 times a day--they treated that eraser jar like a candy jar!)
2. Do I have to sharpen those pencils ALL YEAR?? The answer is no. This year all the teachers at my school got a high-powered sharpener as a gift from our principal (Yay!!! Thank you!!!!) Soon I will teach some responsible students to take over that job for me!
So far, we are 11 days into the school year and it is working like a charm! After a few days of training and daily reminders about being responsible, I finally have a pencil system that works!!! And it only took 14 years to figure it out!
Thanks for reading!
Happy Teaching!
--Stephanie Griffith
A few kinks to work out:
1. Sometimes the pencils get stuck in the dispenser. To unstick them, just push up from the bottom. Or turn the crank the other way to dislodge the jam. Also the rule is that the students must remove the cute erasers from the pencils that need to be sharpened. (This also helped solve the problem of students getting into that eraser jar 10 times a day--they treated that eraser jar like a candy jar!)
2. Do I have to sharpen those pencils ALL YEAR?? The answer is no. This year all the teachers at my school got a high-powered sharpener as a gift from our principal (Yay!!! Thank you!!!!) Soon I will teach some responsible students to take over that job for me!
So far, we are 11 days into the school year and it is working like a charm! After a few days of training and daily reminders about being responsible, I finally have a pencil system that works!!! And it only took 14 years to figure it out!
Thanks for reading!
Happy Teaching!
--Stephanie Griffith
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