Stations, Stations, Stations!

Recently, stations/centers/independent work has been a hot-topic on my campus. All of us teachers love working with small groups of students, but we sometimes struggle to find ways to manage the other 24 students while we are working with the small group. I've used this system to manage my station-work for the past couple of years and it works well for my classroom and teaching style. 

I usually set up 12-14 stations and students rotate through them. I don't get to stations every day, so these 12-14 stations usually last me for about 1 month. That means I have to spend a couple of hours getting my new set of stations ready, but once they're done, I don't have to worry about them again for an entire month. 

Another way I make the work-load easier is by using some stations repeatedly every month. My Spelling Station is always the same. Students don't get bored of it because they only get to it once or twice a month and it's always with different words. My Word Builders station is always the same, but with different letters. Buddy Reading and Vocabulary expectations always stay the same as well. Then I just rotate my more specific skill-based stations in and out of the monthly line-up based on my students' needs. 

Students are able to choose their own math stations/games as long as they are listed in the Math Stations section. I rotate game options every month as well. Finally, there are Finished Early Stations for those quick-finishers. 

All of this structure frees me up to work with small groups for intervention and enrichment!