Reorganizing…One Giant Pile at a Time

I know I’ve posted about it before, but organization is not my strength.  I blame it on being creative…I mean–if I focused my efforts on being organized, that would drain away that crazy “I have a great idea” brain, right?

I’m beginning to see that the opposite is true.

I’m beginning to notice that I spend more time looking for things.  More time wondering if I have already finished something.  More minutes freaking out because I can’t remember if I have a meeting scheduled that day.

So I am vowing to make some improvements–and I’m guessing it will reduce my stress and will hopefully make me MORE creative.  That’s my story, and if you have evidence to the contrary, let me know before I waste much more time!

The first step in trying to grab hold of my life is to sort and purge the GIGANTIC stacks of papers that have been building at school.  I’m note sure what percentage of my issue is my poor organization, my “interesting” class, or the fact that I am on a bunch of committees, or the fact that we keep getting new curriculum/assessment resources OR WHAT…but I have accumulated multiple, huge, towering, ridiculous stacks of papers.  My student teacher is lead teaching, so I am giving myself at least one hour of each day where I don’t observe her directly or pull small groups or students one-on-one to tackle this issue.

For those of you who share my affliction–doesn’t it just wear on you?  I walk by other teachers’ rooms and think, “Why can’t I do that?”  and “I have two degrees–why can I not deal with these paper?”  It is a huge drain on my self-esteem…and I’m going to work at it HARD.  For those of you who are naturally organized, look in the mirror and pat yourself on the back because the rest of us really look up to you!

So here’s what I did yesterday…

Step one…grab on giant pile at a time and sort into categories that I created on the fly.

Grab label maker and a bunch of donated binders.  (I almost got distracted with the label maker but managed, somehow, to follow through the job at hand.)

One pile at a time….sort, purge, sort, purge.  LOOK!  The recycling bin is literally 2/3 full!

Here’s my ending point for Wednesday!  Stay tuned…

SO…I’m teaching a little more today, so I won’t have the 2 hours I took yesterday.  But I am going to tackle this problem a little bit–or a little pile–at a time!  I would CERTAINLY welcome suggestions, tips, bribes, candy, or other encouraging items!  Have a great day…starting out at -13 here.  AGAIN.

Meg