Writing Offices in the Classroom

If you were to ask me my favorite time of the school day, I would hands down tell you it’s our writing time, and particularly our writing workshop time.

I just love the format of that block of time where I have the opportunity to teach a mini-lesson and then my students have the chance to go off on their own and try it using the writing paper of their choice.  My students are actively engaged and I feel like I have the chance to walk around and work with several students either in a small group or individually.

Not to mention, it is always exciting to see how far they have come from the beginning of the year to the end.  It’s such a motivating time of the day.

In Kindergarten, one area my students always struggle with is having the confidence to stretch out the words they are trying to spell and write the sounds that they hear.  Often times I will have students come up to me and ask, “How do you spell?!”  In a class of 20 plus students that definitely makes for a lot of chaos and confusion.

One way I have helped foster independence and confidence with my Kindergartners during our writing time is with a writing office.

Now my students have a variety of writing tools at their finger tips within their writing office for them to use as they practice their writing.  My students are eager to try to write on their own as they look within their writing office for help. Not to mention, it is portable and perfect to use anywhere in our classroom.

Plus, an added bonus is they LOVE to have their own special space to practice their writing.

It’s a win-win for everyone because I can concentrate on the student or students I am working with without getting interrupted and my other students can refer to their office while they are waiting for me to help.

To assemble each writing office I do the following steps:

Step 1: I use two regular size manila file folders.
Step 2: I put a strip of glue on the end of one folder and then place the other end of the second folder on top to overlap just a small amount.
Step 3: I glue the writing pages I want inside the folders for my students to be able to easily see and use as they write.
You can tailor your office to the needs of your class, but personally I like to put the alphabet chart, sight words, vowel chart, digraph chart, writing checklist, and punctuation inside the folder.
These are the tools that my students need the most as they write.
Then, extra writing pages like months of the year, weather, shapes, color words, number words, etc. I glue on the outside of the folder.
My students don’t refer to them as much, but they still have access to them if needed.
Added Bonus: After I laminate the writing office, I adhere a pocket square from the Target Dollar Spot (I can usually find them at the beginning of the year or in January) and easily slip monthly words into the pocket.  This is a great tool to help build vocabulary.
Step 6: Last, I close the folders together and glue the writing office cover to the front.
To keep them durable to use year after year, I laminate the writing offices and store them in our writing workshop area.
After I introduce all the supplies in our writing workshop area at the beginning of the year, the students know they can grab and use a writing office whenever they want.
Thank you for stopping by and reading about my favorite time of the day.  If you found this post useful and would like to try to make your own writing offices, you can click here to access them: Writing Offices
You might also like my FREE email series: Introducing Writing Workshop
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Happy Assembling and Writing!