Alternative Seating Classroom

Hey, everyone! It's Cyndie from Chalk One Up for the Teacher to share one thing I am absolutely loving this year...

For the past few years I have allowed my students to sit where they prefer to learn, but this summer something dawned on me...I never sit at a desk and work. When I am on the computer or grading papers, I am almost always sitting cross-legged on the couch. So if that's how I work best, what about my students?

I began poking around on Pinterest (isn't that where so many great ideas are found?) and came across several posts related to alternative seating or flexible classroom environments.

So very slowly we began transition our classroom. The way our classroom looks now looks nothing like it did at the beginning of the year...and believe it or not, we have much more room now.

Here are some of the places to work in our classroom.

 We started the year with these crate seats that are in our little house. I know several of you use those in your classroom. This year I tried a little something different and put two layers of fabric on top so that when one gets dirty I can just pull off one layer.

 

Thanks to my sweet and wonderful friend, Lisa, from Growing Firsties, I grabbed these scoop rockers on summer clearance at Walmart. They happened to have perfect colors to match our classroom.  

The bonus is that they stack and don't take up very much room at all.

P.S. My sweet friend, Carina, from The Teaching Tornado says they work great for teachers, too.

(You'd never know she was a couple months pregnant in this picture!)

 

This is an old coffee table that belonged to my mom that my wonderful son sprayed with chalk paint.

 

Those were the places that were set and ready to go when school started. Since then, we've added

this cool futon that was on sale at Walmart. My son has it and slept on it every night this past summer 

(his choice), so I knew it would be durable. The kids added the pillows.

So one morning I was scrolling through Instagram and saw Angie Olsen from Lucky Little Learners' post about these yoga balls from Oriental Trading that were on clearance for LESS than $5!

(Sorry, but last I checked they were all sold out.)

Anyway, they were wayyyy better than I thought they would be !

 

This past Friday, I had my amazing custodian raise up one of our tables after Valerie from 

All Students Can Shine posted the suggestion as an alternative to standing student desks.

My kiddos LOVED it, and it saves tripping over chairs, because several of them stand to work anyway.

I have absolutely loved the flexibility that this has provided in our classroom. Of course, we have rules and expectations and if those are not adhered to, my students know they will be asked to make a better choice for themselves. Honestly though, there has been minimal issues in relation to where they sit to work.

One of my very favorite places to be is sitting and working right alongside of them on the floor, or wherever they are.

Now, if you want to check out an inexpensive seating choice that also works in emergency situations, hop on over to my blog to check it out.