Student Desk Drawers {Tried it Tuesday}

Hi everyone! I'm back to link up with Holly from Fourth Grade Flipper for Tried it Tuesday! I love reading about all the different things teachers are trying in their rooms. 

A new thing I tried at the beginning of this school year was desk drawers. I'd seen the idea of using the lid to a copy paper box as a desk drawer on Pinterest. I thought it would be worth a try, so I sent out an email to all my fabulous coworkers and within a few days my room was full of box tops! 

Since I teach 3 different ELA groups each day, I wanted a convenient way to store their journals, vocabulary folders, and writing notebooks. Instead of carrying these materials from class to class and losing them, my kiddos just keep their stuff in the desk drawer. That part of it makes my life so much easier because I'm never holding class to wait on a student who has forgotten a notebook. 

After 9 weeks of use by 4th graders they are still holding up nicely. You can see from this picture that they are sometimes a doodle magnet, but that's no big deal for me. 

The inside looks pretty neat too. There are only 3 folders, 3 notebooks, 3 composition books, and one file/privacy folder in each drawer. The kids have done a really good job of being respectful of each others "stuff" in the drawers. 

My favorite part about it is that my homeroom kiddos can no longer stuff those desks full of papers and junk that shouldn't be there. Since there is not extra room in the desk no one can leave "goodies" that might tempt those with sticky fingers... 

Have you ever used desk drawers. What did you think? Any tips for me?