Classroom Organisers by Students: no-prep lesson plan

Classrooms can be pretty chaotic – after all, there are heated discussions, engaging projects, glitter, teaching tools, posters, glitter, copies, long-lost books, glitter… You know what I’m talking about. For years, I had been trying to make my classroom a nice instagram-like room, but to no avail, so I gave up – and as it often happens, when I gave up, I had an idea.

Classroom organisation has two main problems:

1. the organisation system
2. the students

But what if I made my students create a new organisation system? Make them think of new organisers, boxes, shelves etc? Maybe then it would be easier for them to keep the classroom organised in their own way?

You know this modus operandi – if you can’t fight them, join them. Or, even better, make them join me!

If you want to try this lesson with your students, here’s the lesson plan!

• Lesson: Classroom organisers
• Time: 45 mins
• Age: 9+
• Level: A2 and above
• Areas covered:
  • vocabulary: stationery, school materials, shapes, colours, numbers
  • grammar: prepositions of place, Present Simple for daily routine, 2nd Conditional
  • use of English: asking for advice, being polite, proposing, negotiation, giving/receiving feedback
  • future skills: teamwork, creativity, critical thinking

Introduction: 5 mins

Ask your students to look around the classroom and ask whether they can see some room for improvement (sorry for the bad pun!). Explain you’d like to have a super organised classroom where everything has its place and it’s so easy to find anything you need.

Encourage your students to share their observations on the classroom, then tell them classroom organisation depends not only on you as a teacher, but also on your students. Tell them that today you will practise your English while sharing your ideas on organisation.

My own organisers (group/ pairwork): 10 mins

Divide your students into groups or pairs and ask them to discuss the organisers they have in their own rooms that would work well in the classroom – maybe some special boxes for crayons, trash cans etc. You can also ask them to make a list of the tools, containers and habits helpful to make their own rooms organised.

Alternatively, you can ask your students to make the list of problems they can see in the classroom and they can relate to in their personal space.

What can we organise in our classroom (brainstorm): 5 mins

Once your students have their lists of things they believe could be useful in the classroom, ask them to work together and make a list of the things you can organise better in your classroom – write down the ideas on the board, and then vote for 3-5 most important aspects to organise.

How can we make our organisers (groupwork): 10 mins

Divide your students into as many groups as the organisational aspects you are going to work on. Explain that each group will tackle one problem – they can use various materials provided they would be easy to obtain, procedures that would be easy to follow and tools that would be intuitive to use. Encourage them to come up with ideas that seem funny, creative and easy to understand.

Presentation: 10 mins

It’s almost the end of the lesson! Ask your students to present their ideas to the rest of the group. Use this opportunity to make your students work on giving and receiving feedback – be supporting, refer to the important points of the presentation, avoid personal remarks etc.

Conclusion + homework: 5 mins

Sum up the lesson by saying they not only worked well on their projects, but also managed to practise their English – name the constructions and vocabulary they’ve used and tell them you’re proud of their creativity and their level of English. Oh, and in case they really want to put their ideas into actual objects and procedures – be grateful for their engagement, spend the next lesson on the project creation and be happy to have a classroom that will now be a space your students really care about.