How to Organize a High School Teacher's Notebook

Organize a notebook to keep all the materials important to your classroom and be the most organized teacher on campus. Everyone will be jealous that you can carry one notebook with all your stuff to parent conferences, to department planning sessions, or even to the faculty meeting to work when no one is looking. Read on to learn how to organize a high school teacher's notebook.

Things You'll Need

• Binder
• Dividers

Instructions

1. Buy a binder to use for the entire year as your official teacher notebook. Find one that you really like since you will carry it with your everywhere. Don't buy a cheap one with clasps that will bend or a cover that will crack under the strain of carrying all your paperwork.

2. Create a cover or label to quickly identify your notebook. A fabric book cover can be changed depending on your whim or the season. Quick cover changes can also be achieved with a binder that has a clear, plastic pocket where you just slide in different covers. If you prefer simplicity, just stick a label in the spine with your name and room number.

3. Add dividers, either purchased or homemade. If you make your own, buy card stock or some heavy paper and add stick-on tabs to label each section. Label your dividers "Calendar," "Gradebook," "Lesson Plans," "Class Info," "Seating Charts" and "Miscellaneous." You can add other sections, if desired, but keep it manageable or your binder will become too bulky to carry.

4. Add a pouch or stick-on pocket to your binder to hold essentials, such as pens and sticky notes. Use the sticky notes to jot quick notes to yourself or add things to your calendar or lesson plan quickly. Also add a large plastic pocket to hold things that you need to file and loose papers.

5. Purchase an academic calendar from the stationary store or create your own in a word processing program. Keep only one semester at a time in your teacher binder to cut down on bulk. Printing on both sides of the paper also cuts down on size. Write in appointments, meetings and reminders. Sticky-notes cut to fit the squares is another way to add info to your calendar.

6. Keep grades in the gradebook section using the old-fashioned paper version or by printing out updated gradesheets from your grade program. Add a few blank class roster sheets with columns for jotting down grades on the fly that can later be added to your grade program or gradebook. Always use pencil when entering grades.

7. Design your own lesson plan sheets on the computer or purchase commercial ones from the local teacher supply store. Write in pencil in case you need to make quick changes, or attach a sticky note over an old lesson plan to update it. Keep only lesson plans for the current two units or you will end up with a back problem down the road.

8. Carry only necessary class information in your teacher notebook, such as contact information sorted by class. Any student modifications should also be included so you will have the info at your fingertips for conferences or lesson planning. You can keep the seating chart in the class info section or give it a separate divider.

9. Put anything you feel you need to carry around with you that doesn't fit in one of the other dividers in the miscellaneous section. Clear this section out every couple of weeks.