Controlling Those Copies

Do you........
Have *stacks* of papers?

Have file cabinets full of copies?

Just KNOW you made copies of today's math test even though you can't find them?

Run copies and can't remember if it was for practice or an assessment?

I am pretty sure I just heard:

YES!  

AMEN sister!

You are preaching to the choir, girl! 

How did you know? 

My OCDness can't handle stacks, messy filing cabinets, or losing things. I am not a paper pencil teacher but still seem to need and use lots of copies.

We have a Copy Center in our district. We "send off" for copies we need. District provided materials can be directly ordered from their website. (Which are few and far between, but that is a WHOLE other blog post!)

We send any other things we need copies of to the Copy Center. This can be done electronically or as a hard copy. There is about a two week turn around. But......you can change the default date in an emergency. They have not clarified what an emergency is. *wink wink*

This year my team and I tried something new. We do most of our planning and copy ordering as a team. Since we TRY to adhere to the default date we order as many things as we can in advance.

Planning ahead is good, right???

YES!

Until the copies arrive...

It is SO difficult to remember when or what you had planned using something for when you ordered it WEEKS ago!

These two simple ideas have been a life saver this year!

1. Color Code
We order all of our Formative Assessments on YELLOW paper and our Summative Assessments on GREEN paper. Everything else is on white.

Not only does this keep us crazy overwhelmed exhausted perfect teachers organized the colors are a little trigger for our kiddos! They know that yellow is important and green is VERY important!

2. Code It
We write the week number at the top of each page before we send it to Copy Center! Sometimes we also write F or S. This is because my team gives me the originals and I send them off together. It helps me know exactly how to order!

*Funny little story... Last week I did not have time to send off for a formative I HAD TO GIVE before the end of the grading period so I ran it at school on white paper. I told the kiddos and they said, "It's okay, add it to your 'Miss Take' poster. We will just pretend it is yellow!"

{In my defense it was the week before Spring Break. My brain needed a rest!}

Even if you make your own copies at your school you can still do this!

Do you have any copy tips, tricks or hints to share?