School-Aged Children

End of year school work organization ?

My first grader came home last friday with 3 grocery bags full of papers and work he did during the year, I'm trying to organize them, some I will recycle, but most I will keep, but there's just so much and it's so overwhelming.  PLease share if you have a good way to organize your kiddos work. 

Thank you  

Re: End of year school work organization ?

  • You don't need to save all that stuff, honestly.

    I have found that my own kids are excellent judges of what's "special" and what can be pitched.  When we get a big stack of work home, we generally only keep a few pieces, limited to:

    --artwork that's they're proud enough to display on their own walls.

    --longer writing projects that they worked hard on or got a good grade on.

    I do display artwork on a closet door in our living room.  After a while, I have the kids snap a picture with their digital cameras, and the original either goes in the trash (if they no longer feel so attached to it) or in a portfolio I have for each of them (if they feel very attached to it.)

    I would say that we save about 10 items a year.  Enough to look back on proudly some day, but not so much that we are loaded down with meaningless papers. 

    High School English teacher and mom of 2 kids:

    DD, born 9/06/00 -- 12th grade
    DS, born 8/25/04 -- 7th grade
  • I've weed our a lot, we are down to 2 grocery bag, 2 writing journals, and a writing portfolio, I Will be going through it once more with DH tonight to see. The problem is both DS#1 and DH are hoarders, they would keep everything if they could ( and MIL kept everything for DH). I've decided on a Bin system file and labeled by Grade level,  all first grade work we are keeping will be place in the 2.5 gallon zip lock bag, and will be place under first grade.  All art work, that is a must, I will be snapping a pic of and creating a photo book for them, that's all I have for now, as I am still working on it. 
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  • One trick I have used successfully with my kids when they've wanted to keep absolutely everything is to say "Okay, you can keep stuff, but you have to find a spot for it in your room where it's safe and out of the way."  Stick with them until they either come up with a reasonable solution or decide it's okay to cut down on what you keep.

    When you make them responsible for dealing with the clutter, it's amazing how quickly they come to the realization that all those "precious" papers really aren't that important.

    Another trick is to put stuff in a temporary holding zone.  Anything from the holding zone that hasn't been looked at/played with/reminisced over in _____ months gets tossed.  You know that none of those "important" papers will ever be looked at again.  Keep a few representative items from each grade or you'll soon be buried in papers!

    High School English teacher and mom of 2 kids:

    DD, born 9/06/00 -- 12th grade
    DS, born 8/25/04 -- 7th grade
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