Flexible Seating

I have always allowed some degree of flexible seating in my classrooms. If I had a student who liked to stand, I would raise their desk, put them to the side or back and let them stand. If I had students who liked to work on the floor, I said "go for it!". Like so many things that I have always just instinctively done, suddenly it's everywhere, and it has a name: FLEXIBLE SEATING!

The Why:
Current "best practices" are all about giving students choice. I embrace them all! Choice in what they are working on (Daily 5, Guided Math), choice in their projects (Genius Hour, Book reviews), choice in what they spend their daily "On the Ball" Bucks on in the classroom. Making good choices is an important skill and one that kids need to practice to be good at! So why should where they sit (or stand) be any different? I know that even as an adult, when I am at a conference or workshop and am expected to sit in a chair and listen for hours, I turn into that "disruptive, tuned-out fidgety" kid that drives every teacher crazy!

The How:
Before I attempted to make Flexible Seating in my classroom even more of a thing, I did some research. Mainly looking at blogs of teachers I admire and seeing how their classrooms are set up. When I made my Crate Seats this summer, I took a lot of info from Tammy over at Literacy Loves Company, and she has so much amazing stuff! I loved the way she got her class involved in the decision making process when it came time to tackle Flexible Seating! So following her lead, and the kids and I sat down to talk about it. We discussed the difference between places that are just fun, and places where they feel they could actually work. One of the ideas that came up is that many of them wanted a way to have some privacy when they were working. That surprised me, as they have never asked for or tried to find privacy... but we talked about it, and they idea of foam board privacy walls was put on the chart. We added all the spaces they like to work, and then they each got two sticky notes to add to the chart.

This was when everyone voted for privacy walls,
So I took it off the list, saying we could get a class set,
and they changed their votes. 

After the second vote. We don't actually HAVE a couch,
but now I will try to find one. On the CHEAP!

 I found the results very interesting! Not one kid voted for a regular table and chairs, and that is one thing we actually do have in our room. This explains why it ends up just being a dumping ground for me! lol I was also interested that 5 kids (that's almost 1/3 of the class) voted to just keep using their student desk like normal. The "low table with pillows" got only two votes the first time round, but then got the most the second time! There may have been some peer pressure involved here, but it is an easy one to try, as I have a table that lowers, and some fundraising money to buy pillows. It's a start!

Next up... a trial run! Stay tuned...