One Month with Flexible Seating: Was it worth it?

It’s been about one month since the school year started and I began my first year using flexible seating. If you’d like to see how I got started and learn how you can begin your classroom transformation, check out my previous post here. You can also check out my Instagram post here to see full before and after pictures of my classroom.

After months of researching, shopping, and coming in during the summer to transform my room, was it worth all the work? Absolutely.

My New Classroom Layout

When I decided to change up my seating to incorporate non-traditional seating, I had two main factors that I had to consider: money and my own teaching experience. To furnish my room, I had to rely on what I could find in my school’s basement, old furniture I no longer needed, and about $250 I get every year to buy school supplies from the NYC Department of Education. Anything else had to come out of my pocket, and trust me, my pockets are not deep. When it came down to it, I did not have the money or resources to have more than two large tables and one couch area in my room.

Additionally, I’ve never done flexible seating before, and even though I was super excited to undergo this huge project, I really had to no idea how to teach lessons and classroom manage when students are sitting in non-traditional seating arrangements. I also thought back to the various seating arrangements I’ve had in the past, from table groups to rows, to how I currently have them, in a U-shape. In the past, I’ve always had classroom management issues, especially with 9th graders when I had students seated in groups, so I was nervous I would have the same non-stop chattering again if I had kids permanently sitting in groups.

Due to those two main factors, I settled on what I think of as a halfway point between complete flexible seating and traditional seating. I still have my 32 student desks in a U shape at the front of my classroom facing the SmartBoard, but I also have two desks outside of the U for individual work, two tables with chairs for group work, and a cozy couch and rug area. Additionally, I also have 3 yoga mat sized rugs that students can use to work on the floor anywhere in the room.

How I Made it Work

Most of my lessons, even before I used flexible seating, were based on the Workshop Model, meaning that after a brief Do Now and teacher-led mini-lesson, my students dive into a reading, writing, or group activity to dig deeper into the content we are learning. Therefore, I didn’t have to alter my actual lessons or classroom instruction much, except where in the past, I would have assigned groups, I now let students choose if they want to complete the work alone, with a partner, or in a small group. During this time, they are allowed to sit on the couch, the floor, at the tables, or move around the student desks to complete their work. I actually love the “academic noise” or the working chaos, as I call it, of having some kids sitting at desks, some laying on the floor, some sitting cross-legged on the rug, but all doing their work.

There are definitely some exceptions I have, and please do not think that my classroom is always picture perfect. Two of my classes currently are particularly chatty and I learned quickly, that if I let them choose their partners, my room quickly went from working chaos to just chaos. Very few students ended up actually getting their work done and honestly, it made me feel like I didn’t have control of my classroom.

Therefore, with those two classes, I always assign their groups to a certain extent. I still try to give them some flexibility, for example, by letting them opt out of group work and work alone and letting them choose where to work.

What I Love about Flexible Seating

First of all, I love love love my classroom now and can never go back to having a classroom that looks, well, like a regular classroom. The number one thing I hear from students and adults as they enter my room is that they instantly feel welcome and a little more relaxed. I am firmly convinced that a positive physical environment can make all the difference. Even for myself, when I walk in and see my flowers and brick walls, I just feel at home instead of at work. When we look around and see nice things, we just feel better!

It’s the same reason why we feel so good when our home is clean and tidy rather than when it's messy.

So even if flexible seating seems like a little too much right now, I recommend going to your local dollar store ( I love Dollar Tree!), or Five Below (where I got a LOT of cheap decorations!) and decorate your room a bit to your taste, for you. Because you deserve to spend your time in a place that makes you feel good.

Second of all, I love my flexible seating arrangements because it makes group work so much more engaging. My teacher heart is so happy when I see kids discussing around a table, or absorbed in their reading on the couch. The students are so adorable when they are sitting cross-legged on the rugs doing work with each other. I have to say, just giving them a taste of a little freedom to work how they are comfortable, really makes for a more engaging and happy work environment.

The Un-Instagramable Side

Not everything or every class period is picture perfect. Keeping my classroom clean and undamaged is a daily task. Despite spending TWO days going over class norms, expectations, and having students create their own rules for the flexible spaces, I still have students who draw on the furniture, leave their empty drink containers on the floor near the couch (despite a strict no food or drinks allowed rule!), and most frustrating of all, they keep breaking the leaves of my aloe vera plants! It takes everything in me to not take it all away and say “This is why we can’t have nice things!” but rather I make each student go back and clean up their mess. However, unfortunately, some of the time I don’t notice the damage until the class is over and the students have left.

Also, if you are not okay with noise, then flexible seating will not be for you. Flexible seating promotes group work and discussion, so you will definitely have students talking and noise levels can get high. However, I actually love when kids are debating, laughing, and expressing themselves, so I love the academic noise. The tricky thing is to constantly be circulating, asking questions, and listening to their conversations to make sure they are on task. If you’re having issues with off-task behavior, then I would suggest making groups, assigning chatty kids to work individually, and scaling back on some of the freedom they have until they prove themselves mature enough to make good choices in the classroom. I also make sure that group work has some graded piece attached to it, whether it is an exit slip or I am simply grading their discussions. It could be as simple as a check mark that they earned their participation points, but when students feel that they are being graded, they will behave better and do their work.

All in all, despite having to do some extra management controlling my chattier classes, incorporating flexible seating into my classroom has made my room more welcoming and helped my students be more engaged and work more collaboratively. This is definitely something I will continue to do as part of my teaching style and I look forward to adding more tables and individual work spaces in the following years, or when I find them!

#flexibleseating