Today's post comes from Momentous School fourth grade teacher, Kim Robinson.
 
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Our students spend more time in our classroom than they do even with their own families. I want our classroom to be a comfortable, happy space for them – their home away from home. We do lots of things to make this their comfortable space. We have pictures of their families, and of course their artwork all over the classroom. But I have also added one tiny detail that makes the room even a little more like home for them.
 
Each student in my class has a small corkboard. They’re welcome to fill it with anything they like. We talk about it at the beginning of the year, and students will bring in an item and share it with the class before posting it to their board. By the middle of the year, it’s much less formal. Students are free to add or remove items from their corkboard as they wish.

Many of the students post the little notes I write them when I acknowledge them for something. They also post pictures, trinkets, some of their favorite things. It’s fourth grade, so we have sports pictures and movie characters. It’s a nice little peek for me into what my students value. But more than that, it’s a special place for the students to personalize. After all, this is their home for much of the day and I want the space to reflect that.