Purge Your Paper Clutter | Minimalism in the Classroom, Part 2

This post is the second in my Classroom Minimalism Mini-series. Missed the first one? Find it here.

After determining your big why for applying minimalism to your classroom, you’re ready to begin the process of decluttering to bring your space into alignment with your goals. 

With my intention being spending less time managing supplies and looking for things and more time creating lessons and curriculum content, it quickly became clear that paper clutter was an area that required attention. In our digital age, storing and locating physical copies of things is often incredibly inefficient – yet all sorts of paper clutter still collects in my work and storage spaces.

While I can’t tell you exactly what materials you should keep in hard copy, in this post I will offer a sorting strategy and three questions you can use to help determine what papers to keep. But, before diving in, a quick reminder: The goal of tackling paper is not to better organize all of those documents – it’s to keep only those items that are truly essential and digitize or discard the rest.

A Sorting Strategy for Paper Clutter

It’s likely that you probably have some kind of centralized space where most of your paper clutter tends to collect – whether that’s a desk, a filing cabinet, or some other workspace. I choose not to have a desk in my classroom, so for me, it’s a paper organizer I keep on a countertop that is often overflowing with extra copies of student handouts from months ago, professional development papers, and lots of sticky notes with random ideas scrawled on them. To make the most impact, I suggest starting your paper declutter by diving in with this space. (Note: Try to find the space where random papers accumulate; I’ll deal specifically with curriculum materials in my next post.)

Before beginning, you’ll need three things:

1. A chunk of time large enough to actually make progress (at least an hour, but a morning or afternoon is better)
2. A sorting space – any nearby flat surface can work well, like a desk, table, or countertop
3. A trash can and a recycling bin

To make the sorting process as efficient as possible, I recommend setting up sticky notes or baskets with the following category labels:

1. Process – Paper that should probably be kept, but needs to be reviewed or relocated
2. Digitize – Documents you could easily digitize or notes that you could collect electronically
3. Shred –  Paper with student information
4. Action Needed – Paper that you need to submit or turn in somewhere
5. ? – Items that require further evaluation
6. Not paper – For non-paper things you find

With this system set up, you’re ready to begin. The goal is to work as quickly as possible, looking briefly at each piece of paper and putting it into one of the piles or the trash/recycling bin. Do not overthink this step – if you aren’t sure, put it in your “?” or “Process” pile and keep going. Continue until you’ve cleared all of the paper detritus from your workspace and are left with just these five piles.

Questions for Deciding What to Keep

After completing the sorting technique described above, you hopefully discarded lots of paper into the recycling bin or the trash. Keep your “Action,” “Shred,” and “Digitize” piles where they are for now; it’s time to focus on winnowing down the “Process” and “?” piles. To do this, you’ll want to create a label for a new pile – “Keep in Hard Copy.”

Here are the questions that will help you determine what papers are truly essential to maintain in hard copy. Review each item in your “Process” and “?” piles and consider the following questions to determine whether it should ultimately end up in the recycling bin, the “Digitize” pile, or your new “Keep in Hard Copy” pile.

1. Did I use this document or material this year? Will I use it next year?
   If you didn’t actually reference or use a piece of paper this year and have no clear plan for it in the next year, it’s unlikely to be something you’ll miss having in hard copy. In fact, unless it’s something truly amazing, it’s probably a good candidate for the recycling bin.
2. Do I have an electronic copy of this?
   For some reason, I used to print out physical copies of almost everything and now have lots of needless duplication in my teaching materials. If you already have an electronic copy of the item, you can probably safely recycle the physical copy. For me, this now includes the 1-5 extra copies I find of every handout I give to students — I simply put these into our 1-side good paper bin that students use for projects.
3. Can I make an electronic copy of this?
   If you want to truly reduce the paper that you’re managing, digitizing as much of it as possible will make the biggest difference. Even important documents, like evaluations, can be scanned and uploaded rather than kept in a binder somewhere.

Warning: Avoid the Trap of Digitizing Everything!
Keep in mind that you will actually have to spend time and energy making a digital copy of everything you decide to keep in electronic form, so try to avoid the trap of keeping something digitally that you actually don’t need! When shifting through professional development handouts, I now apply stringent criteria and will often tear out and digitize only the one or two pages that directly apply to my work.

Processing What Remains

Phew! You sorted all of your paper clutter and now (hopefully) have a much smaller pile of items that you’ll need to keep in hard copy. Don’t let too much time pass between finishing this initial sweep and taking action to fully process your remaining piles.

• Complete the items in your “Needs Action” pile.
• Take care of your “Shred” pile.
• Bring your digitize pile to a photocopier and use it to quickly scan and send digital copies of your documents to your email. You’ll want to rename and put those files into your digital document organizer (Google Drive or your computer) so you can locate them later. Recycle the physical papers right away so you don’t have to interact with them again.
• Create an organization system for your “Keep in Hard Copy” items that will allow you to find them quickly and easily.

Keeping Future Paper Clutter at Bay

After completing this paper clutter purge, you should have a better sense of the types of documents that you’ll want to keep in physical form and the items that you’ll be digitizing. This will help you process incoming paper more effectively and efficiently in the future.

I will share my new paper-organizing system once I’m able to set things up in workspace after summer cleaning, but I know that I won’t be going back to my many-slotted organizer — it offers too many opportunities for me to stash things rather than properly take care of them. As you plan your own paper organization system, you’ll want to consider these three components:

1. A place to store and collect papers that you’re currently using or that are incoming. (Temporary storage)
2. A place to store and sort papers that you’ve decided to keep in hard copy. (More permanent storage)
3. A place to electronically record notes to self. (Bye bye sticky notes!)

I hope that this post helps you reduce the paper clutter in your classroom and better manage future paper that comes your way. If you have other strategies that have worked for you, please leave a comment. In my next post, I’ll tackle how to streamline curriculum materials.

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Stacks of Paper Photo Credit: myrfa on Pixabay