I didn't get into my new 4th grade classroom until 1 day prior to workshop week.  With a (still pretty new) baby and 3 year old, I didn't want to give up any of my summer time with them.  I DO NOT regret that decision!!  However, I was overwhelmed when I came in the Friday before workshop to start setting things up.

Luckily things came together.

The biggest task... organizing my books.  I was worried that I wouldn't have enough chapter books, so I did do some shopping and ordering over the summer.  Turns out I had more than enough... the below photo represents about 1/5 of my total # of chapter books & doesn't even include the thousands of picture books I have.  Crazy.  

Luckily, I have a wonderful friend/ colleague who was willing to come in on a Friday afternoon to help me organize.  People like her make a challenging profession possible.  So thankful. 

I'm pretty pleased with the end result.  Note... my room is not fancy or cutesy. This is not because I'm lazy.  It is purposefully a blank slate because I want the room to represent student learning NOT my fabulous decorating style (okay & I don't really have a lot of decorating know-how- so luckily, my philosophy supports my lack of decorating talent!).  

The results:

Like I said- not too fancy, but a perfectly functional blank slate, ready for students to learn.

I polished things up a bit during workshop week.  We had our Open House on Wednesday.  Open house went great... after years of doing 1st grade open house, it was really nice having 4th graders come in who "knew the ropes." They organized their materials & had a look around.  I enjoyed meeting all of them!  

On Thursday, we had our "district day."   All the employees squeezed into the high school auditorium.  The big surprise... US Senator Al Franken (& SNL alum) gave the opening address!  I met him in the cafeteria prior & he did his Stuart Smalley routine just for me.  Obviously, it's going to be an AMAZING year if that is how it was kicked off.  Happy 2014 school year everyone!

Here is a Stuart Smalley clip in case you don't know this sketch... it's a good one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DIETlxquzY