Prepping for the End of the School Year
Ideally, you will have been doing regular cleaning in your classroom all year long, so preparing your classroom for summer will not be difficult or time consuming.
Continue your regular classroom cleaning so that the preparation for summer is much easier.
If you have not been on a cleaning schedule for your classroom, this is a great time to start! Even one week of decluttering will make a difference when you start preparing for the summer shut down. Go to my posts about Getting Started and Decluttering to jump right in. In those posts, I also discuss tips for making the end of the school year smoother for you as the teacher.
I save this step of breaking down my classroom until the last two or three days before students are dismissed. You do not want to wait to do it by yourself when you could have students help with minor tasks like sorting. Even having students hand you containers while you are on a step ladder means you are saving the time it takes to get up and down off the ladder. Enlist their help!
Step One: Make a Plan!
Before you begin breaking down your classroom, start with a basic plan. This will include three main categories:
Tasks you will do yourself
This will include anything that is dangerous or not age-appropriate for your group of students
This will include handling fragile items
This will include using cleaning supplies not appropriate for students
This will include removing hooks from the ceiling, high bulletin boards, curtains, etc.
This could include sorting files of curriculum, or that could be a summer project
This will include handling student files that others should not access
Tasks you will have students help with
This will include sorting student materials they use in the classroom (crayons, scissors, etc.)
This will include wiping down desks, cubbies, chairs with basic soap and water
This will include handing you boxes or containers while you are on a step ladder
This will include sorting and re-boxing games, puzzles, manipulatives
This will include checking classroom library books for pages that need to be repaired
Tasks or items you plan to take home over the summer
This could include any activities you want to sort or purge but don’t want to spend the time doing right now
This could include your curriculum materials to do some summer planning
Spend the time in step one really walking through your classroom to see which tasks the students could help you complete, and which ones you will have to do yourself. Districts all have different policies about enlisting student help for tasks, so make sure you are clear on what you can ask students to do before you start. I write these things down on a list so on the day we are ready to get to work, I can check them off. If you are doing this as a class, you will always have students asking what they can do next.
Step Two: If you have anything that can be done
without deconstructing your room, do it!
This is where you utilize the cleaning systems I’ve explained in detail in my other posts! Don’t deviate from that system… just keep moving forward! Each area of your room will take care of itself in time if you stick with your plan. If you have designated some items on your list that you will complete over the summer, begin taking them home. Do this only if students will not notice that they are missing from the classroom. If you have containers in cabinets that you want to sort over the summer, you can remove them at this point. However, if students start to notice or they feel like you are “done” then they will start to mentally check out and behaviors will increase! I highly recommend not breaking down any visible areas of your classroom until the last week of school.
Step Three: Cleaning Up Fragile Items
On the day you plan to clean with students, come in early and box up the items you do not want them to handle. This will include any decorative items that could be broken. This also includes pictures with glass. Even though students will most likely not break these things, it’s just easier and smarter to do it before they arrive.
Step Four: Cleaning up with Students!!
I choose to do this step the last week of school, usually the second-to-last full day with students. I keep the last full day for our classroom party and game day so that we have a fantastic last day together. (Our last day of school is for awards and is a half day). It is helpful to have something for all students to work on at their desks during this process. In my classroom, they have memory books to complete. This allows you a chance to take a break and keep them busy, and allows students to take a break if they are overwhelmed.
Assign the tasks you wrote down in step one.
Decide whether you will have all the students working on tasks at the same time, or divide them into groups of working on cleaning, or working in memory books. This will depend on your preferences as a teacher, and the personalities of your students. This could change from year to year, so be flexible and don’t be afraid to change it up if what you expected isn’t going they way you wanted.
Just like you did for your regular cleaning, set your timer for 15 minutes and have the working groups work on a task and then take a break. Set the timer for another 15 minutes and have a different group of workers focus on a task while the first group is on break. Continue this pattern until the classroom is packed up.
Step Five: Storing the Packed Boxes
Decide where you will put the items that are normally visible in your classroom for the summer months.
Find our how much of the furniture will be moved out of the classroom during the cleaning process. This is different for each school. If they are moving everything in order to clean the floors, they may ask you to remove all items from shelves. They may also say everything can stay on shelves, but they might not move those shelves, or the shelves might be tipped in order to transport them. Depending on the situation, decide what you will remove or leave on those shelves. If you leave things, make sure your cover them with paper or plastic so things do not fall off in the process of summer cleaning.
Maximize your cabinet space by putting as many items in them as possible. HOWEVER, make sure you are not shoving small pieces of games and manipulatives that really should be sorted into their existing containers.
If you are storing items on top of cabinets, then put them in boxes or bags to minimize the dust that will accumulate on them.
When I store my baskets that contain classroom library books, for example, we clean them out, sort the books, repair covers, and put the books back in the baskets. I put each basket in a plastic shopping bag and store them that way. I don’t have to re-sort boxes of books when I set up my classroom because they are stored in their assigned baskets already. You can use this idea for anything that is sorted in a similar way.
If you have heavy boxes, make sure you are storing them in a sturdy location that won’t put stress on the shelves themselves.
Try to limit the amount of items that the cleaning and maintenance staff will have to move as much as possible.
Leave access to areas of your room that need repair by the maintenance staff. If they need to fix a counter, don’t pile a bunch of boxes on it.
Ask the cleaning and maintenance crew how they want your items to be placed in your room when you leave for the summer. Do they want it all against a wall, in the middle, desks and tables stacked or not? Limit the amount of personal/ classroom items in this pile as much as possible. If you have items there that could be placed on top of cabinets, it is ideal to do that.
Anything that will be moved to a hallway during the cleaning process for your room should be individually marked with your name and classroom number.
Cover cabinets or cubbies with large sheets of paper, plastic, or plastic table cloths. If the cleaning crew has said you can leave things on bookshelves, cover them, too.
If you plan to leave your bulletin boards in place, cover them with paper or plastic so they are not damaged when the cleaning crew washes or paints the walls.
Spot-check your room to make sure you haven’t missed anything and then enjoy your summer!
