Back To School Organizational Tips

If you’ve been around for awhile, you know I love organization. At the end of last summer, I shared 16 organizational tips on my Instagram page. I decided it was probably a good idea to compile them all into one place!

1. Make your schedule in Excel: It makes it easy to add and move students all year long. Read this blog post for more details on how I schedule.
2. Make an Excel all-in-one-glance sheet: This includes student names, teacher, grade, IEP due date, triennial due date, speech hours, and goals. Read this blog post to get my free template.
3. Data binder: I still do paper logs because it works for me. I have logs separated by grade level. At the beginning of the day (or before I leave the day before), I pull out all the logs for the kids I will be seeing and put them in order.
4. Working files: If you’re new to your school, go through working files and see if they are up to date. Since I’ve been at my school for awhile, at the end of every year I make sure there is a current IEP and recent eligibility paperwork in them. I also keep my paper logs and work samples in these.
5. Reward systems: Find a system that works for you! For a few years now, I’ve been using slime. My kids will generally all work for the promise of playing with the slime for 2-3 minutes at the end of every session. Read this blog post  for my reasons! The best slime that I’ve found is at Target and it’s called Planet Putty.
6. Screenings: I have a folder with all my screening forms and screenings. I have to screen all incoming K students, plus any new to county 1st, 2nd, and 3rd graders.
7. Material storage: Everyone needs to find a system that works for them, but this is the one that I’ve been using for a couple years now.

8. IEP due dates: At the beginning of the year, I go through and write all my IEP due dates on my calendar. I use a monthly planner, so when I start each month I can see what IEPs need to be scheduled.

9. Pillowcase/sheet storage: Don’t throw out those zipper bags when you buy pillowcases or sheets. I’ve used these forever to store therapy materials I want to keep together. 

10. Planning by the month: I’ve talked this one to death, but planning by the month has significantly reduced the amount of time I spend planning outside of work. As in, I don’t ever plan outside of work anymore. Read this blog post for more details.

11. Email folders: I keep folders in my inbox, because I hate having a full inbox. I have a mailbox for each school I’m at and an SLP folder for emails I want to keep. My goal is to basically not have any emails sitting in my inbox.

12. Command hooks: I have these things allllll over my office. They are great for storing resources I use frequently. I have a few right behind my therapy table, so I can reach back and grab things.

13. Day to day practices: At the end of every day, I try to clean up my workspace and get logs out for the next day. I’ll also get out materials or anything I need for the next day, so I can start fresh when I walk in.

14. Sticky notes: I use regular sticky notes and the ones on my desktop. I always have at least 2-3 lists going at any given time and love the feeling of crossing something off.

15. Student Speech Goal Display: I have this hanging up on my whiteboard. The kids know to come in, write their name, and I’ll tell them what they’re working on each session. It’s available in my TPT store by clicking here.

16. Evaluation Tracker: This is a freebie in my store and I use it every year to keep track of the evaluations that I do. Click here to grab it.

There you have it! All my best organizational tips in one place. I hope they help get your year started off on the right foot!