As a new teacher, it was hard to wrap my head around the fact that I would have to purchase a large portion of what I needed to run a classroom. Not to say that the basic supplies for students wouldn’t be taken care of, but that my personal organization system and content creation supplies would need to be self-funded. It was therefore important to spend my money wisely, thus creating a list of Classroom Supplies French Teachers Can’t Do Without.

ESSENTIAL TEACHER SUPPLIES: A LIST OF CLASSROOM MUST HAVES.

Over the course of the last 4 years, I have purchased my fair share of organizational systems and content creation supplies. Some were failures, many were researched for months and verified with fellow staff to see if this system would work for my specific needs.

Thankfully I am able to write-off a number of my expenses (if I save the receipts), so it isn’t all a wash, but I still want to make sure my hard-earned money isn’t wasted on items that aren’t peak-useful in my limited space.

Specific needs?

As a Core French teacher, we don’t have a classroom. We are rotary. This means I share an office with 3-6 other teachers. We are all limited to the immediate space at our desk, the wall above it, and maybe the file cabinet beside it if we are lucky. We also aren’t given too much realestate in the classrooms we are teaching in.

Therefore it is important to have an organizational system that works well in the office, quickly finding it for teaching purposes, and describing it via email to any guest-teachers replacing you unexpectedly.

Correspondants

Every once in a while, you will receive a gift from parents for all the hard work you do with their child. This often gets more than just an email home to show gratitude. Having a stash of holiday-free note cards and thank you cards at your disposal will go a long way to saving you time when it does happen.

Come holidays, write a friendly message on each card and personalize as needed. When you have 140 students, writing over the summer break doesn’t seem so bad.

• personalized note cards
• thank you notes
• envelopes

Content Creation Supplies

Creating all the amazing centers, manipulatives and teaching materials needed for Core French takes a lot of supplies. Not everything is provided by the School Board or can take a while to be purchased through vendors. Many schools allow teachers to purchase on their own and be reimbursed after the fact, while some require teachers to sign out the Schools credit card and purchase approved materials that way. Either way, they will not be made available in the schools supply room.

• Personal laminator
• Laminating sheets
• Colour Printer – the office generally has 1 printer, but may limit how many coloured copies you make. Bingo, Bam, Go fish among others may not be the best use of this limited option at the school level.
• Storage Containers Box for Photos – best way to store all manipulatives and center materials
• Velcro dots
• Magnets
• Magnet strips
• Card game holders – Used for Bam cards and Go Fish.
• Large ziploc bags
• Clothes pins – for Clip it centers.
• 10 frame pop its – Grade 1/2 learning their numbers
• Individual dry erase boards and markers – some classrooms have these already for math but not all. Double check.
• 3-4 cookie trays that can fit legal sized paper
• Card stock – For printing Go Fish and Board Games.
• Sharpies

Note – I have purchased my fair share of Laminator sheets, always looking for the best bang for my buck. The latest set, 500 sheets of Amazon brand sheets, seems to pull away from the pages easier than the Scotch brand. “Get what you pay for” aside, my primary students are pretty hard on my laminated cards. I have run them through the laminator days after they have been damaged and they came out looking brand new.

Kids are hard on teacher-bought items, mostly because they don’t own it. I don’t expect my materials to make it through the year, but I do expect them to survive 5 classes a day of use. Once the unit is over, I look over them and replace anything that is not good enough for next year. Then I can simply store it away and forget about it until needed.

Center Organization

• Mini baskets – each station has everything it needs in the basket
• Dice
• Bingo dabbers – for crafts, not playing bingo.
• Bingo Counting Chip Plastic Markers – I like to laminate Bingo cards to use in all my classes, and over the years.
• Game pawns

Supplies for Organizing

• bins to collect folders/homework/etc.
• bins to collect completed assignments
• buckets or bins to organize photocopies
• binders
• page protectors
• dividers with tabs
• butterfly clips in various sizes
• single hole punch
• zipper binder pocket
• tiered office paper file organizer

Prize Bags

As a rule, I ask my grades what they would like to have as prizes. If they want it, they will work for it. This year, I teach Grade 1-8. Not all grades will want the same thing and I am not running around the city every month to replace items in my prize bag. So now I simply have 2 bags, stored in my office.

One bag is Jolly Rancher hard candies from bulk barn. They are individually wrapped so the risk of Peanut contamination is negligable ( I always warn those with allergies and they have the option to get something from bag #2). The hard candies are Halal for my Muslim students, and all grades love them equally.

The second bag is actual prize toys and they are for my Grade 1-4 classes. I don’t believe in giving small children sugar during the day. This bag is full of dollorama and Amazon goodies that I find on the cheap. There is always a rotating list of items depending on what I find and when.

• Fidgets
• mini erasers
• race cars
• Pencils
• mini note books
• playdough
• pop-its

There you have it, everything that I have ever purchased for my Core French classroom. Once my office is clean enough, I will take pictures of these items being used in the real-world. I found a trolly that wasn’t in use and this has quickly become an extension of my work station as well. It can easily move around the room if it is in the way. No, I do not take it with me to my classes, somply because there is a flight of stairs that I must venture several times per day and it is not trolly-friendly.

And yes, many of these items are stored at home while not in active use, like the laminator and sheets. I tend to print and laminate in the evening, and cut during prep-periods.