Welcoming Walls

Last year, I had a blast with my nature-themed hallway display. I created a tree from brown craft paper and changed the decor to suit each season. My favorite part of the tree was a charming heart carved (or drawn) into the trunk that said First Grade. (I taught first grade last year. Now I teach kindergarten. Consistency is overrated!) In the fall, we started with red, orange, and yellow leaves that said each student's name. Alas, no pictures are readily available of the fall tree.

The winter tree was devoid of leaves, but it was surrounded by unique snowflakes. Again, each said a student's name.

In the spring, each girl's name was on a butterfly and each boy's name was on a leaf.

As you can imagine, this became a bit time consuming. This year, I decided to go for something more straightforward and less seasonal. While browsing Pinterest, I stumbled upon the slogan "Twinkle, twinkle little stars... Look at this neat class of ours!" I decided to run with it.

I wrote each child's name on a yellow star and attached it to the wall outside my classroom. Above the stars, I hung typed pages with my fun new slogan. Naturally, I glued these to scrapbook paper to make them pop! I also hung metallic stars among the yellow stars to make things more twinkly. On the first day of school, I took photographs of all the kids whose parents gave permission. Then, I hung each child's photo on his star. Since I can't show you a picture of the finished project, here's a look at the work in progress.

I love this display because it's low maintenance and fun. The kids feel very special seeing themselves on the wall. All in all, it's a sparkly way to keep it class-y, ya'll.