My Best Advice for Art Teachers Getting Ready for a New School Year

Starting a new school year when you are a teacher is often overwhelming. Every year, it was a given that I would head home from those first staff days with a blossoming migraine. Changing routines from the summer and new stresses combined with the usual stresses—like being stuck in professional development when you desperately need time in your classroom—take a toll.

As I have gotten older, I am more in tune with how society is impacted by September and the school cycle. Just like we can count on the days growing shorter and cooler, we can also anticipate back-to-school sales and even changes in traffic (very real and predictable where I live in the suburbs of Boston). Every year, I not only scrambled to get my classroom ready, my syllabi written, and my sub plans in, but I also managed to get two kids ready for their school year. As the years have passed, I developed strategies for managing the back-to-school crunch, and I am sure many of you have as well. So, please share them in the comments!

• It’s easy to get overwhelmed—this is true for new and returning teachers. Please know that you don’t have to have the year mapped out. Things will shift and change, so don’t put the cart before the horse. Know that it is OK, particularly at the beginning of the year and early in your career, to focus on a few days at a time. You only need to be ready for tomorrow.

• Know when you can get into the school to prep. I had a school that waited until two weeks before school to empty and wax the art room floors. So, I came in periodically before then and enjoyed the school’s quiet since I physically couldn’t get it closer to opening. The two weeks before school started, when my room’s floors were being waxed, you could find me enjoying summer break until the end. When I had to report, I tried to stay zen about plugging all the wires back into my computer and other reminders of the upheaval to my room at the end of summer. What can’t be cured must be endured!

• Don’t spend time decorating your classroom; focus on organizing. Think about the classroom layout, how students will access supplies, where you will do demos, etc. Stop looking at Pinterest, Instagram, and all those other places where teachers are showing off their decorated classrooms. And you know what? Studies have even proven that highly decorated classrooms aren’t conducive to learning.

• Room-wise, you do want to think through your classroom layout. Think about the flow of movement in the room during clean-up, getting out supplies (I always had a table in the front with supplies needed for their current project), putting work away, visibility to the board/projection area, your ability to get around to help everyone during studio time, etc.

• Figure out storage of projects. Can you buy portfolios for every student? One per table? Or will you make them from the railroad board? Or use flat files? What about three-dimensional work?

• What are your classroom rules? Are you going to have an incentive program?

• Come up with a system for keeping supplies from walking. For some supplies, this is an issue of safety, like with exacto and utility knives. With other items like pencils and Sharpies, this can be unconscious or outright theft. Either way, it’s a drain, and there are simple strategies that you can prep before the school year to minimize supply loss. More information on strategies can be found in articles like this on pencils, or our collection of art teacher hacks here. Use the search bar for other articles on art teacher “hacks.”

• On that topic, consider a strategy for supply “borrowing” from other teachers. Check out this article that covers strategy options for borrowing from the art room.

• Don’t plan on having all your supplies before the school year starts. Besides the flukiness of supply chain issues since the pandemic, all the schools in the country are ordering all at once. While I had to have my supply order anywhere from January to June, depending on the school, typically, those orders aren’t made until the new fiscal year (normally July 1), and even then, people are on vacation, and schools are running on minimal staff. So, plan your first lessons with the supplies you already have.

• Think about what to do with early finishers. We have some ideas for you HERE.

• Find out what your school requires for syllabi before you start writing one. That’s a great idea, and you can do that at home during the summer. More on syllabi, HERE.

• Take care of personal stuff as the year approaches so you can focus on school in September (or whenever you start). Fill prescriptions, get a haircut, buy back-to-school clothes and shoes, make and freeze some meals, etc.

• Every pencil sharpener I have ever used has been frustrating until I discovered this one. Get it.

• Things to research about your school: Can you create an Amazon wish list? Can you ask families to provide necessities like pencils, Sharpies, sketchbooks, etc.?

• Know your school’s phone policy, and with that knowledge, figure out a complementary policy for cell phones in your classroom. Then, lather, rinse, and repeat ad nauseam (if managing cell phones is vital to you). More about phones, HERE.

• Sub plans. If you have time at the end of summer, do your future self a favor and prep your substitute lessons. My schools have generally wanted three substitute lessons that anyone could execute. If you know you will be out, you can leave sub-plans more specific to where you are in your curriculum, but these sub-plans could be used in an emergency. They often look like a handout- no prep, mess, etc. I think this is harder for art teachers because it is such a hands-on sort of class and because we often have so many more preps than, say, an English teacher might. We have some great sub plans here at My Art Lesson. Use the search bar to search “sub plans.” We have general ones, like this one, and others specific to Ceramics or Graphic Design classes.

• Take advantage of the back-to-school sales of markers, rulers, and other art room basics.

• Put together your emergency stash on your desk. Mine includes tampons, deodorant, a travel-size toothbrush and toothpaste, a few granola bars, and more. Check out this article for a larger discussion on what to have in your stash.

In the comments, share your best art teacher’s advice for prioritizing and making life manageable during back-to-school time.

Also, visit Hacks to make life easier come school start for other ways to prepare for the school year.