Free Tools to Help You Stay Organized this School Year

Classroom organization – whether you love binders and making lists or can't keep track of anything, having an organized classroom is essential to maximize student learning. Not only can it help your students, but it can also save you hours of time lesson planning and grading, While buying color-coordinating bins can get expensive, not all organizational tools have to cost you an arm and a leg.

Here are a few of my favorite free organization tools to help get your new school year off on the right foot.

Free Teacher Checklist/Grade Sheet

One way I help myself stay organized is by having a teaching binder. I created these fillable checklist forms to help me keep track of important information including grades that I need to enter into my digital grade book and who has (or hasn't) brought back that field trip permission form.

I love that these are fillable PDFs because I can type my student list at the beginning of the school and save it for use all year long.

When I fill up a grade record or checklist, I just hop into the file and print a new one, which saves me a ton of time rewriting my student list over and over. It literally takes me two seconds to hit print.

Since I know we are all busy, I wanted to share this free checklist/ assignment trackers with you.

You can get them here.

Teacher To-Do Lists

If you've read my article about creating a burn-out prevention plan, you've probably already seen these awesome to do lists.

The goal of these lists is to identify the three most important things you need to get done and DO THEM!

I think we've all had that mega long list that never actually gets done. This organization tool is designed to prevent you from feeling overwhelmed by breaking your list into easy to tackle chunks based on priority.

You can grab the template by entering your email below:

Small Group Instruction Forms

These editable forms, created by Stephanie over at The Learning Chambers, are an easy way to keep track of your small group instruction.

Use sticky notes to record notes and important info for each student in your small group. Find out more about how Stephanie uses these forms in her classroom here.

Copy, File, Grade Drawer Labels

Have a set of Sterlite drawers you plan to use to capture all that paper clutter? Then you FOR SURE need these.

Created by Caitlin over at Teaching Sweet Shoppe, these colorful drawer labels will keep you organized and hide those stacks of paper from view.

You can grab these drawer labels here.

Find out more about getting organized for a great year in these articles:

• How to create a more effective classroom this year
• Get what you need for your classroom without breaking the bank