Bare Walls:  An Empty Canvas

My thoughts/feelings/philosophy about this is that the room should be an empty canvas.  As we learn throughout the year, we fill our room with evidence of our learning.

I prefer student created things on the wall. This includes COLORS, NUMBERS, and SHAPES word walls.  For our classroom, the only thing that is up the first day of school is our calendar wall.

None of the things on our walls are store bought. I feel that the children are more “attached” to and are more likely to USE the resources on the wall if they make them.  Sure, it takes time to do this, but we make the time to create the environmental print that we end up using all year long (Writer’s Workshop).  At the end of the year, students take the things we've made over the year home.