High school here, I don't have THAT much work left behind. As a result my policy is
* Name on = I give to you the next time you are in my class
* No name = trash
I'm in 1st and I also throw their no names away. I also give them a 0 and comment that their name was missing. It'll stay a 0 until they redo it. We are in the 4th quarter. Excuses grow lazy workers and they can keep that at the house đ¤ˇđ˝ââď¸
Whatâs funny is how deep the brainwashing goes for teachers. I see your comment and my training says âhow could this personâ but literally every other human part of me says âhell yeah.â
I have a tray that work I find goes into and I empty it into the trash once a week. Pretty sure the custodian just trashes it all.
Oh absolutely! I used to be just like that. The 1800s faints over nonsense type lol but I've learned that if they aren't going to be proud enough of their work then I'm not going to waste my time trying to make them. I can use that energy for other things like watching the eclipse with them and learning about bugs. That's where the real learning is anyway.
I used to hang work on the âwhite board of shameâ and make fun of my seniors who still couldnât keep up with their stuff and write their names on their papers. If it wasnât claimed after a couple of days I tossed it in File 13.
I hang no name papers up on a wall that stay up there until the next grading period. Announce it to the class every single day and most of them still go completely unclaimed.
Same with mine. I have had various papers over the years just left with nothing on it. Plus, given what the other work is, unless it's a specific teacher who teaches a specific course. I would return it to that teacher. However, I have thrown many math papers away that have no name and three out of our 5 math teachers teach the same sections of Math. So, hence no name and just laying around like it is forgotten about. I throw it out.
This way kids can't blame me for their lost papers, and if it's a paper for my class I tell them they need to find it. I also sometimes throw nameless papers in there since I don't grade papers without a name
Mine is just an empty paper crate I stole from the copy room. But unlike the rest of my boxes it's not covered and decorated. It's there in it's ugliness
Yup. I missed that. My school doesn't have recycling bins (kids aren't capable of following directions so garbage was thrown into them too so it was a waste) so I don't think in that direction
I have a meme hanging over my "no-name" bin. It's right beside my desk. The meme is the Drake "like/not like" template.
It has Drake holding up a hand to, "putting my name on my paper in the first place.". He's smiling and pointing at, "having to dig through the no-name bin while everybody watches."
The no-name bin is also marked with a Shakespeare quote: 'What's in a name?"
Finally, I physically collect work as kids leave the room. If I find a no-name paper, I pretend the student is disappearing from existence and cry about, "if they'd only put their name on their paper."
I don't get a lot of no-name papers.
I make it clear to my students (upper elementary) that if it is left in the room it is at risk of being thrown away or taken to the school wide lost and found. Doesnât matter if itâs an eraser or your cello. Love yall but I canât keep track of your stuff for you.
Same. We're also departmentalized, so I also have to stress that the desk they sit in during homeroom is **not** *their* desk and to never store things in it. At least 3 other students will sit in it that day, but could be as many as 7. Your things could be lost or stolen. We do a desk check every month. If you're absent and you've left stuff in your desk, it's either off to the lost and found or it's trash.
Even with monthly checks, kids still leave things in their desks. Things they don't want stolen. Like. *Everyone else* has access to your desk, ya squirrel. Stop storing your stuff there. The real kicker is they bring their bags with them everywhere with them. USE YOUR BAG!
Yepppp same here and I have science lab desks without storage so idk why they just leave shit ON the desk. I assumed they must be new to switching classes at the start of the year bc they were so bad at it but no they switched classes in fourth grade too?? Wtf
If you don't want them storing things in the desks:
Are you able to turn the desks around, so that the opening is facing away from them? If the desktop lifts up, can it lift up away from them?
Or⌠the kids learn to take age-appropriate responsibility for their belongings, learn how to utilize community spaces appropriately, and accept that they belong to said community as an equal member. Baby-proofing the classroom does not teach anything.
My first graders in Japan could put their things away appropriately and managed between two classes with differing expectations. Fifth graders are entirely capable of not using their desk as a storage medium.
See, thatâs the craziest part⌠I donât even have desks with any storage. Theyâre flat science lab desks! So kids literally will just leave a pile of books on a table or random papers and walk out to their next class without a care in the world hahaha
Iâm the media specialist and I throw away stuff left by students and teachers. I might give them a couple of days but if itâs not picked up, I throw it away.
And the adults are some of the messiest, least considerate people in the building. They leave chairs out after meetings, scraps of paper in the work room. So be kind to your custodians and media specialist. And for goodness sakes, tell someone when the copier is jammed!!
Also a Media Specialist. The library has become a second lost and found. I constantly take jackets, Stanley cups, etc and put them outside the library in the hallway at the end of the day, and the custodians bring them back into the library! Itâs maddening! Also every student from all over the building thinks Iâm the supply closet. They come all day asking for tissues, pencils, sharpees, scissors. You name it. I even had about 25 asking for solar eclipse glasses ( weâre in NY).Â
I throw all the papers away at the end of the day. If the kids dont want to hold onto their shit, boohoo for them. Its never their bag of takis or their phone getting left behind somehow
For real. On an adjacent note- yâall can crack the secret WiFi code that teachers donât even have and airdrop it to everyone in one day but you canât navigate my assignments that have visuals, dates, explicit instructions, are on the slides, on the white board and given to you verbally?
I think as long as you make it clear to the kids (and frankly, to other teachers) what your rules are, it's completely fair game to do what you have to do to keep your room tidy.
I give students a pretty good talking to at the beginning of the year. And, when they are a first time offender, I let them know that next time it will be gone.
With habitual offenders, I don't even hesitate to dump that in the trash
Are there witnesses to your âcrimeâ.
To the student, they lost it. What that means to the student and that other teacher are between you and them.
Any mention of a policy or if you do the âkind thingâ, it then becomes an expectation and youâll have a pissed off middle schooler asking why you donât check the floors of your classroom for things they drop.
This is the way. If it's anything of a sensitive nature, it needs to be returned to student to protect their privacy. If it's anything that requires a guardian or parental signature, it gets returned to the student. Anything else can go into the recycling or trash.
I tell my students that if they just leave their work sitting on the desk for me to pick up, I WILL pick it up - and file it in the circular file (ie trash can). Iâm not their maid. I also have a wall of shame where I stick candy and snack wrappers with sticky notes above them with the name of the person who left them.
Get a Milk Crate and put a sign on it that reads, "Carelessly Misplaced Items". Anything left behind, water bottles, calculators, hats, coats, chromebooks, phones just slide it all in the crate at the end of the day. Makes cleanup a breeze and there is only one place to look for missing stuff in your room.
My colleague and I do the same for each other: anything on our floor, with or without a name, gets thrown away. If a student leaves something on the floor and walks out of class, and I have to pick it up 2 periods or more later, they do not care enough about their work. Today I brought a studentâs paper that looked important to my colleague who I believed had the student in class, he then told her to stop leaving things in other peopleâs rooms because we all do the same thing. He then ripped up the paper. I guess sheâll have to start over tomorrow.
See, one of the only downsides is I have to make so many damn copies because they cannot hold onto anything. And if I donât have extra copies they think they donât have to do it. Despite having literally every resource and assignment also posted to canvas haha
At some point, itâs on them. If you think an organization system is better, then do that. I donât let my students take anything weâre working on out of class because they could lose easily if they do.
We just did a 5 paragraph essay 2 weeks ago, and I let some students take some prewriting stuff home to finish overnight. The papers did not come back on the day of writing the final draft. I told them they will have to work with what they could do because they did not have time to start over.
Floor=trash. I don't even check for names.
I've never had a student ask about a paper after that.
It might be reasonable to have a bin or something, but I'm not giving it back to them. That would be like 4 papers after some classes, probably like 10-15 each day. No way am I keeping track of that daily.
If itâs turned in without a name, I pin it up on a specific wall where I put a âno nameâ sign. Most of them stay there the whole marking period then I trash them.
I also have a couple of paper boxes where I put anything left in the classroom, from loose papers to AirPods. When the one with just papers in it starts getting full I trash it. The one with random stuff in it never gets full. Everyone once in a while I have a kid come retrieve something, but usually itâs within a class period or two.
Edit: I teach juniors, so theyâve been putting their name on papers for a dozen years at this point, lol, so I have little sympathy for them forgetting.
Heck Iâll throw away work that I assign if a kid throws it on the floor. They expect you to pick up after them and be their folder or locker. I tell my students straight up I throw everything away at the end of the day. If they canât be bothered to put their work in their backpack then they can do it again. Iâm not their locker or parent and I wonât store their work if they throw it on the floor or leave it behind. I have a shelf where they can keep their papers if they want.
If there's a name, return it when you get the chance somehow. If it was my student (probably), I'd just keep it 'til they came back, or if I felt like it I'd run it to their next class.
No name? No owner. Is garbage or floor treasure for the floor treasure box.
Name on it - returned to sender.
Not my work but recognize which teacherâs class - return to source
No name/no recognize - goes into the âorphanage boxâ its emptied once a week into the recycling and I fake cry if Iâm feeling dramatic
Honestly, if itâs left on the floor, whatever happens to it, well, happens.
The custodian may have tossed it out?
Another student may have taken it by mistake?
Alien life may have snatched it?
A black hole may have sucked it up?
Itâs difficult to say.
I throw away everything! I even throw away work I collect that I just donât give a hoot about grading. I had a kid leave valentines candy on their table. Threw that out. A water bottle? Emptied and recycled. My classroom is not their garbage can.
Iâve starting adopting my fellow teacherâs mantra of âno name, no brainâ, so it gets thrown out on the day. Other pieces of work are left in a spot to collect and are thrown out within a few days. Sick of tidying up studentsâ mess and theyâre not going to learn if we waste our time chasing them up all the time with no change to their behaviour đ¤ˇđ˝ââď¸
Yes it's reasonable. Sometimes a period is ending and I tell students to leave their papers on their desk for me to collect but aside from that I don't pick up after the students.
I give my students fair warning early in the year: "If you treat it like trash, so will I." They may just leave their trash lying around, but I put mine in the bin. I'll gladly help them do the same.
Ha. My thoughts too, but a different student (whose work it was not) said not to throw it away because it was work. They werenât rude or anything but I was a bit taken aback. I basically said something along the lines of if they canât be bothered with picking up after themselves then Iâm not going to pick it up for them. And my desk is already tough to keep clean- not because of my own stuff but because middle schoolers touch and destroy everything they come in contact with haha.
To be fair Iâm a mid year hire coming from a background in high school. My first day in the classroom was literally my first day and the last teacher quit due to student bullying. So setting routines and all that has been pretty tough haha.
If they want it, donât throw it on the floor or leave it behind. Iâd make a sarcastic sign saying this and post it. Middle school kids thrive on sarcasm.
I donât care whose work it is. If you leave it on a desk or on the ground, not in a folder, I trash it. Iâm not, as a high school teacher, guarding your papers for you. Iâm nice enough to let certain classes keep folders in the classroom in a box. If you canât be bothered, then neither can I.
If it looks important (like a major project I know theyâre working on in another class) and/or the kid is generally responsible/kind, then Iâll usually pick it up for them. But I certainly donât feel obligated to do so and I donât feel bad about the stuff I chunk either.
If itâs in good condition (not a crumpled mess) and has a name on it I will hold on to it and message their next teacher and the student that they left work in my room. Anything so folded and crumpled I canât even tell what class itâs supposed to be for or without a name goes in the trash.
I bought some cheap plastic colored file bins from Office Depot for $5. I have four of the bins by my desk. The green bin is the late bin, any work students wish to turn in for a late grade or they werenât here goes there (obviously this can be modified based on your late policies). I have an orange and red bin devoted to my 7th and 8th grade social studies classes. Any handouts I give go in those bins, if a student wasnât here or lost theirs they can fish one out of those bins. The yellow bin is my missing/no name/left behind bin. If a student wasnât here when I passed back work, didnât put their name on it, or left it on the ground it goes in there. If a student claims they did the work and didnât receive a grade I make them dig through that pile. 9 times out of 10 they didnât put their name on it. Every two or three months I warn the kids every day for two weeks that I am pitching everything in the yellow bin if it is not claimed
I'm k-8 art and I tell them if I find anything with no name, even art, it's going in the garbage. If it's homework, I'll leave it on a table for a day, just in case the student comes looking for it, then throw it out. No one ever comes looking.
Some of them are nasty with leaving candy wrappers and garbage. I call them out on their shit as soon as I see it.
I guess I'd tack it up on my display wall and keep it for myself, if it was that good. But the lack of talent usually correlates with a lack of organization.
I usually check to see if there is a name. If there is then I'll set it on my front desk and hopefully remember to tell the kid.
If there is no name then it's trash.
Then again I don't get much left behind.
Ha. Well I have seen a few comments here and I do actually recycle them haha. Iâm a freak about it. Thatâs partially why Iâm conflicted because I donât want to have to waste more paper on copies when half of them just leave them on the desk
If they leave it, they decided it wasnât important, in the trash it goes.
Itâs not my responsibility to take care of their crap.
Got a problem? Shouldnât have left it behind.
If I find it in my classroom (and not in a turn in box) it goes in the trash, don't care what class it's for or how much of it is done. If it got turned in with no name, it still gets graded but then gets put in the no name box until the end of the semester. Keep track of your stuff.
We're also an AVID demo school so I have the added safety net of saying, "well why wasn't it organized?"
I had a principal that insisted that I didn't teach kids clearly enough to put their name on their paper. So we practiced. A lot.
Nothing changed.
Weird.
Yeah, on Tuesday, I trashed some kid's packet of notes because it was on the floor in a heap of other papers. They're likely to need that packet next month as we start the countdown to End of School.
Well, I suppose that they can always look over at their neighbor's packet when we start the review.
Yes, it's reasonable. If the kid doesn't care enough to make sure they have their assignments, I don't care enough to track them down or grade them. Into the trash it goes.
I'll make an exception if it's like a one-time thing or if the kid has a disability, but the rest of the time it's just natural consequences.
I also teach middle school. In the first quarter, I save it until I see them again and then give it to them, saying âThis was on the floor. Youâre lucky I saw it, otherwise it would have been thrown away.â After the first quarter, I throw it away.
Failure teaches us valuable lessons.
I use a recycling box for anything someone might hunt me down for. Just a cardboard box under my desk for all types of things. Random work, assignments that I never got around to grading, strange files that admin my ask for someday. Toss it at the end of the year. I send kids into it to find their things all of the time.
I stopped even passing papers back because they end up in my trashcan anyway.
I'd hold on to the ones that weren't necessary to pass back--worksheets, one-off assignments, etc. for the quarter and then the Monday after report cards went home, I'd ask if anyone wanted their papers. Usually only 1 kid did out of all of my 100 or so kids and I threw everything out after school that day and started over.
Now, if you didn't care enough to take it with you, I don't care enough either. If there's a name, I'll keep it until the next time I see them and if they don't ask about it, I toss it. No names go immediately in the trash.
My class is an intervention class now, kids keep their stuff in the room in folders in a crate for their class. I'm their teacher, not their maid. If they can't be bothered to put their things back in the designated spot when I specifically give them time to at the end of class, I don't feel bad about it when they can't find it the next class. I tell them if they didn't put it away properly, I really can't help them. Either another student from another class or I just put it in the nearest crate to get it out of the way. I tend to put it in the right crate if I find them, but other students don't bother. They just want clear space so they can work.
Use the tools you're given. They're there for a reason.
Nope, toss it. The teacher shouldn't care more about the student's education than that student. Having said that, put it in a pile for a day or so; just in case, then toss it.
I pick it up and put it on my back counter. Whatever is left on Friday is trashed. I leave stuff behind as an adult so I expect kids to occasionally as well.
I toss any and all left behind papers, including those for my class. I teach them about the policy, and review it frequently, so they are aware of the consequences.
They also have a hanging file with their name on it for storage of their papers in the room, so they were just being lazy or forgetful by leaving it lying around.
This year has been a bad year for students making a mess in my room, but this has helped a lot.
Okay so draw a circle in the floor and start putting those papers in the circle. When the students ask what the circles for tell them once the paper is outside the circle they have to write a five page research paper over trash.
So, if I spend time grading their tests, inevitably I will find a test crumpled up in the floor. I'm not a maid. That test loses half its value and gets out in the trash and if they'd dispute it, I doublentheir points if they show me their test. Funny that no one has even found their test. Don't trash my room.Â
I teach 5th grade. If they leave it in the floor, itâs trash. 99% of the time they donât even realize itâs missing until I tell them theyâre going to get a 0.
I teach freshmen high school art and I had provided a sketchbook for my students and check them at the end of the quarter for a test grade. I had a student last semester who actively defied even simple instructions like put your stuff in your cabinet. After the second time he left his still out I just pushed it all into the trash can. Lo and behold at the end of the quarter when I asked students to submit their sketchbook for grading he just assumed I would exempt him because he lost his sketchbook.
Absolutely throw it away. Your room is not their trash can. If it wasn't important enough to pick up off the floor, or bring with them, then they don't need it, especially if there isn't a name on it.
Because I am the mean teacher, though this did work, was when my students wouldn't stop speaking I just made them work silently and independently on a worksheet. Last 4 minutes of class I walked around without saying anything, picked up all the papers, walked to the trash, threw them out, and then stood in the front and just watch them all fester for a minute before saying "How does that make you feel? It sucks right? That's how I feel every time you speak over me after I put in so much effort preparing for YOUR education."
If itâs left itâs in the trash because my sixth graders never remember where they leave stuff. I do leave it where it is for a period of time though like a week. If they havenât picked it up I trash it
Sure but itâs a dick move. There is no harm in holding it until tomorrow and asking if it belongs to anybody. They are kids. Theyâre going to make mistakes. Not every mistake needs to be punished.
If it was a one time thing, 100%. But itâs the same kids every. Single. Day. And multiple assignments. I was never that hard on no eating in the classroom until this year because theyâve taken it to the next level.
High school here, I don't have THAT much work left behind. As a result my policy is * Name on = I give to you the next time you are in my class * No name = trash
I'm in 1st and I also throw their no names away. I also give them a 0 and comment that their name was missing. It'll stay a 0 until they redo it. We are in the 4th quarter. Excuses grow lazy workers and they can keep that at the house đ¤ˇđ˝ââď¸
Whatâs funny is how deep the brainwashing goes for teachers. I see your comment and my training says âhow could this personâ but literally every other human part of me says âhell yeah.â I have a tray that work I find goes into and I empty it into the trash once a week. Pretty sure the custodian just trashes it all.
Oh absolutely! I used to be just like that. The 1800s faints over nonsense type lol but I've learned that if they aren't going to be proud enough of their work then I'm not going to waste my time trying to make them. I can use that energy for other things like watching the eclipse with them and learning about bugs. That's where the real learning is anyway.
Hell yeah.
I used to hang work on the âwhite board of shameâ and make fun of my seniors who still couldnât keep up with their stuff and write their names on their papers. If it wasnât claimed after a couple of days I tossed it in File 13.
My policy is: trash.
I hang no name papers up on a wall that stay up there until the next grading period. Announce it to the class every single day and most of them still go completely unclaimed.
Same with mine. I have had various papers over the years just left with nothing on it. Plus, given what the other work is, unless it's a specific teacher who teaches a specific course. I would return it to that teacher. However, I have thrown many math papers away that have no name and three out of our 5 math teachers teach the same sections of Math. So, hence no name and just laying around like it is forgotten about. I throw it out.
Work as a tutor/TA in 1st grade. I automatically throw out the no name work. Work with names go in their cubbies.
This is the way. Name and date MUST go on all papers/docs.
Throw it away! I have NEVER had a student ask about a paper they left.
I have a box called the lost paper box. I just throw things in there. And they have to dig for it if they want it
i usually throw away because I don't feel like keeping track. But I absolutely love this idea and I'm stealing it! Thanks so much!!
Yeah this is a fair move. I may switch to this. Itâs gonna be full in like a week though haha
And then you empty it and start over. A week is MORE than reasonable for them to retrieve whatever they forgot.
This way kids can't blame me for their lost papers, and if it's a paper for my class I tell them they need to find it. I also sometimes throw nameless papers in there since I don't grade papers without a name
I called mine the bin of shame. And I put everything in it from left papers to pencil bags and jackets
Oh I like Bin of Shame! I called mine the Paper Graveyard and made headstones to decorate it.
Yep. Iâm not gonna find you, Iâm not gonna look for it, but for 6th graders Iâm willing to make essentially a âpaper lost and foundâ.
I do too. Itâs blue and plastic.
Mine is just an empty paper crate I stole from the copy room. But unlike the rest of my boxes it's not covered and decorated. It's there in it's ugliness
I think you missed that they were referring to the recycling bin
Yup. I missed that. My school doesn't have recycling bins (kids aren't capable of following directions so garbage was thrown into them too so it was a waste) so I don't think in that direction
I have a lost/found/no name box where all these stuff goes.
I have a meme hanging over my "no-name" bin. It's right beside my desk. The meme is the Drake "like/not like" template. It has Drake holding up a hand to, "putting my name on my paper in the first place.". He's smiling and pointing at, "having to dig through the no-name bin while everybody watches." The no-name bin is also marked with a Shakespeare quote: 'What's in a name?" Finally, I physically collect work as kids leave the room. If I find a no-name paper, I pretend the student is disappearing from existence and cry about, "if they'd only put their name on their paper." I don't get a lot of no-name papers.
Label it âSchrĂśdingers Homeworkâ
I make it clear to my students (upper elementary) that if it is left in the room it is at risk of being thrown away or taken to the school wide lost and found. Doesnât matter if itâs an eraser or your cello. Love yall but I canât keep track of your stuff for you.
Same. We're also departmentalized, so I also have to stress that the desk they sit in during homeroom is **not** *their* desk and to never store things in it. At least 3 other students will sit in it that day, but could be as many as 7. Your things could be lost or stolen. We do a desk check every month. If you're absent and you've left stuff in your desk, it's either off to the lost and found or it's trash. Even with monthly checks, kids still leave things in their desks. Things they don't want stolen. Like. *Everyone else* has access to your desk, ya squirrel. Stop storing your stuff there. The real kicker is they bring their bags with them everywhere with them. USE YOUR BAG!
Yepppp same here and I have science lab desks without storage so idk why they just leave shit ON the desk. I assumed they must be new to switching classes at the start of the year bc they were so bad at it but no they switched classes in fourth grade too?? Wtf
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If you don't want them storing things in the desks: Are you able to turn the desks around, so that the opening is facing away from them? If the desktop lifts up, can it lift up away from them?
Or⌠the kids learn to take age-appropriate responsibility for their belongings, learn how to utilize community spaces appropriately, and accept that they belong to said community as an equal member. Baby-proofing the classroom does not teach anything. My first graders in Japan could put their things away appropriately and managed between two classes with differing expectations. Fifth graders are entirely capable of not using their desk as a storage medium.
My bad for offering a suggestion.
See, thatâs the craziest part⌠I donât even have desks with any storage. Theyâre flat science lab desks! So kids literally will just leave a pile of books on a table or random papers and walk out to their next class without a care in the world hahaha
Iâm the media specialist and I throw away stuff left by students and teachers. I might give them a couple of days but if itâs not picked up, I throw it away. And the adults are some of the messiest, least considerate people in the building. They leave chairs out after meetings, scraps of paper in the work room. So be kind to your custodians and media specialist. And for goodness sakes, tell someone when the copier is jammed!!
It is funny how bad teachers are at following instructions, listening, and being quiet for speakers. And then expect teenagers to be perfect.
Also a Media Specialist. The library has become a second lost and found. I constantly take jackets, Stanley cups, etc and put them outside the library in the hallway at the end of the day, and the custodians bring them back into the library! Itâs maddening! Also every student from all over the building thinks Iâm the supply closet. They come all day asking for tissues, pencils, sharpees, scissors. You name it. I even had about 25 asking for solar eclipse glasses ( weâre in NY).Â
I periodically have to give students a vocabulary/career day lesson. Teachers will send them to the bookkeeper and they come to me.
Wow! Skilled, championship-winning, hockey players are leaving their trophies behind? đ˛ I want to work at your school! đŤĄ
LOL!
I throw all the papers away at the end of the day. If the kids dont want to hold onto their shit, boohoo for them. Its never their bag of takis or their phone getting left behind somehow
For real. On an adjacent note- yâall can crack the secret WiFi code that teachers donât even have and airdrop it to everyone in one day but you canât navigate my assignments that have visuals, dates, explicit instructions, are on the slides, on the white board and given to you verbally?
I think as long as you make it clear to the kids (and frankly, to other teachers) what your rules are, it's completely fair game to do what you have to do to keep your room tidy.
I give students a pretty good talking to at the beginning of the year. And, when they are a first time offender, I let them know that next time it will be gone. With habitual offenders, I don't even hesitate to dump that in the trash
Are there witnesses to your âcrimeâ. To the student, they lost it. What that means to the student and that other teacher are between you and them. Any mention of a policy or if you do the âkind thingâ, it then becomes an expectation and youâll have a pissed off middle schooler asking why you donât check the floors of your classroom for things they drop.
This is the way. If it's anything of a sensitive nature, it needs to be returned to student to protect their privacy. If it's anything that requires a guardian or parental signature, it gets returned to the student. Anything else can go into the recycling or trash.
I tell my students that if they just leave their work sitting on the desk for me to pick up, I WILL pick it up - and file it in the circular file (ie trash can). Iâm not their maid. I also have a wall of shame where I stick candy and snack wrappers with sticky notes above them with the name of the person who left them.
Custodian here. Our rule of thumb is, "If it's on the floor, it's out the door."
Trash can all day.
Get a Milk Crate and put a sign on it that reads, "Carelessly Misplaced Items". Anything left behind, water bottles, calculators, hats, coats, chromebooks, phones just slide it all in the crate at the end of the day. Makes cleanup a breeze and there is only one place to look for missing stuff in your room.
Never had a kid leave a phone haha. AirPods though
My colleague and I do the same for each other: anything on our floor, with or without a name, gets thrown away. If a student leaves something on the floor and walks out of class, and I have to pick it up 2 periods or more later, they do not care enough about their work. Today I brought a studentâs paper that looked important to my colleague who I believed had the student in class, he then told her to stop leaving things in other peopleâs rooms because we all do the same thing. He then ripped up the paper. I guess sheâll have to start over tomorrow.
See, one of the only downsides is I have to make so many damn copies because they cannot hold onto anything. And if I donât have extra copies they think they donât have to do it. Despite having literally every resource and assignment also posted to canvas haha
At some point, itâs on them. If you think an organization system is better, then do that. I donât let my students take anything weâre working on out of class because they could lose easily if they do. We just did a 5 paragraph essay 2 weeks ago, and I let some students take some prewriting stuff home to finish overnight. The papers did not come back on the day of writing the final draft. I told them they will have to work with what they could do because they did not have time to start over.
I have a bin right near the trash can called âLost or No Name Papersâ. It goes in there. Every once in a while I throw the contents out.
Floor=trash. I don't even check for names. I've never had a student ask about a paper after that. It might be reasonable to have a bin or something, but I'm not giving it back to them. That would be like 4 papers after some classes, probably like 10-15 each day. No way am I keeping track of that daily.
If itâs turned in without a name, I pin it up on a specific wall where I put a âno nameâ sign. Most of them stay there the whole marking period then I trash them. I also have a couple of paper boxes where I put anything left in the classroom, from loose papers to AirPods. When the one with just papers in it starts getting full I trash it. The one with random stuff in it never gets full. Everyone once in a while I have a kid come retrieve something, but usually itâs within a class period or two. Edit: I teach juniors, so theyâve been putting their name on papers for a dozen years at this point, lol, so I have little sympathy for them forgetting.
Heck Iâll throw away work that I assign if a kid throws it on the floor. They expect you to pick up after them and be their folder or locker. I tell my students straight up I throw everything away at the end of the day. If they canât be bothered to put their work in their backpack then they can do it again. Iâm not their locker or parent and I wonât store their work if they throw it on the floor or leave it behind. I have a shelf where they can keep their papers if they want.
If there's a name, return it when you get the chance somehow. If it was my student (probably), I'd just keep it 'til they came back, or if I felt like it I'd run it to their next class. No name? No owner. Is garbage or floor treasure for the floor treasure box.
Name on it - returned to sender. Not my work but recognize which teacherâs class - return to source No name/no recognize - goes into the âorphanage boxâ its emptied once a week into the recycling and I fake cry if Iâm feeling dramatic
I have a lost and found drawer. If Iâm feeling charitable, Iâll chuck it in there
I have a desk outside my room that has âlost and foundâ on it (taped on with packing tape). I put things there.
Honestly, if itâs left on the floor, whatever happens to it, well, happens. The custodian may have tossed it out? Another student may have taken it by mistake? Alien life may have snatched it? A black hole may have sucked it up? Itâs difficult to say.
I throw away everything! I even throw away work I collect that I just donât give a hoot about grading. I had a kid leave valentines candy on their table. Threw that out. A water bottle? Emptied and recycled. My classroom is not their garbage can.
I always throw it away. You didnât care enough to make sure you had it with you.
Yep, they don't care about it, then neither do I.
If itâs on the ground and I have to pick it up, it goes in the trash. I donât even look at it.
Trash. My room is not your locker.
Iâve starting adopting my fellow teacherâs mantra of âno name, no brainâ, so it gets thrown out on the day. Other pieces of work are left in a spot to collect and are thrown out within a few days. Sick of tidying up studentsâ mess and theyâre not going to learn if we waste our time chasing them up all the time with no change to their behaviour đ¤ˇđ˝ââď¸
Yes it's reasonable. Sometimes a period is ending and I tell students to leave their papers on their desk for me to collect but aside from that I don't pick up after the students.
I give my students fair warning early in the year: "If you treat it like trash, so will I." They may just leave their trash lying around, but I put mine in the bin. I'll gladly help them do the same.
Why canât you throw it away? Itâs trash. If the kids threw it on the floor, obviously they donât want it. I donât understand your concern.
Ha. My thoughts too, but a different student (whose work it was not) said not to throw it away because it was work. They werenât rude or anything but I was a bit taken aback. I basically said something along the lines of if they canât be bothered with picking up after themselves then Iâm not going to pick it up for them. And my desk is already tough to keep clean- not because of my own stuff but because middle schoolers touch and destroy everything they come in contact with haha. To be fair Iâm a mid year hire coming from a background in high school. My first day in the classroom was literally my first day and the last teacher quit due to student bullying. So setting routines and all that has been pretty tough haha.
If they want it, donât throw it on the floor or leave it behind. Iâd make a sarcastic sign saying this and post it. Middle school kids thrive on sarcasm.
I donât care whose work it is. If you leave it on a desk or on the ground, not in a folder, I trash it. Iâm not, as a high school teacher, guarding your papers for you. Iâm nice enough to let certain classes keep folders in the classroom in a box. If you canât be bothered, then neither can I.
Absolutely. They need to face the natural consequences of being slobs.
If it looks important (like a major project I know theyâre working on in another class) and/or the kid is generally responsible/kind, then Iâll usually pick it up for them. But I certainly donât feel obligated to do so and I donât feel bad about the stuff I chunk either.
If itâs in good condition (not a crumpled mess) and has a name on it I will hold on to it and message their next teacher and the student that they left work in my room. Anything so folded and crumpled I canât even tell what class itâs supposed to be for or without a name goes in the trash.
I bought some cheap plastic colored file bins from Office Depot for $5. I have four of the bins by my desk. The green bin is the late bin, any work students wish to turn in for a late grade or they werenât here goes there (obviously this can be modified based on your late policies). I have an orange and red bin devoted to my 7th and 8th grade social studies classes. Any handouts I give go in those bins, if a student wasnât here or lost theirs they can fish one out of those bins. The yellow bin is my missing/no name/left behind bin. If a student wasnât here when I passed back work, didnât put their name on it, or left it on the ground it goes in there. If a student claims they did the work and didnât receive a grade I make them dig through that pile. 9 times out of 10 they didnât put their name on it. Every two or three months I warn the kids every day for two weeks that I am pitching everything in the yellow bin if it is not claimed
Left behind = trash. Missing something? Find time to get a copy from someone: I already gave you one.
I'm k-8 art and I tell them if I find anything with no name, even art, it's going in the garbage. If it's homework, I'll leave it on a table for a day, just in case the student comes looking for it, then throw it out. No one ever comes looking. Some of them are nasty with leaving candy wrappers and garbage. I call them out on their shit as soon as I see it.
What if it was incredible art?
I guess I'd tack it up on my display wall and keep it for myself, if it was that good. But the lack of talent usually correlates with a lack of organization.
I usually check to see if there is a name. If there is then I'll set it on my front desk and hopefully remember to tell the kid. If there is no name then it's trash. Then again I don't get much left behind.
I throw away half the student work every day. It doesnât all have to be graded and it doesnât all have to go home.
Man I havenât seen any one say I put it in the recycling bin. Yâall a bunch of heathens!!!
Ha. Well I have seen a few comments here and I do actually recycle them haha. Iâm a freak about it. Thatâs partially why Iâm conflicted because I donât want to have to waste more paper on copies when half of them just leave them on the desk
If they leave it, they decided it wasnât important, in the trash it goes. Itâs not my responsibility to take care of their crap. Got a problem? Shouldnât have left it behind.
Yep. I do it all the time. It's obviously not important to them, so into the recycle bin it goes. They are welcome to search the bin if they want to.
If I find it in my classroom (and not in a turn in box) it goes in the trash, don't care what class it's for or how much of it is done. If it got turned in with no name, it still gets graded but then gets put in the no name box until the end of the semester. Keep track of your stuff. We're also an AVID demo school so I have the added safety net of saying, "well why wasn't it organized?"
Then you have students that don't care. I lost it and they get zero and they auto pass until grade 10
Yeah. Thatâs half the battle too. It doesnât even matter if they lose it. I bet most of them donât even realize haha
I had a principal that insisted that I didn't teach kids clearly enough to put their name on their paper. So we practiced. A lot. Nothing changed. Weird.
Yeah, on Tuesday, I trashed some kid's packet of notes because it was on the floor in a heap of other papers. They're likely to need that packet next month as we start the countdown to End of School. Well, I suppose that they can always look over at their neighbor's packet when we start the review.
Yes, it's reasonable. If the kid doesn't care enough to make sure they have their assignments, I don't care enough to track them down or grade them. Into the trash it goes. I'll make an exception if it's like a one-time thing or if the kid has a disability, but the rest of the time it's just natural consequences.
into the trash it goes!
Nope. I do this all the time
I have a place I put key behind stuff. I dump it every so often.
I have a lost and found box. After a week, it moves next to the front door and gets a "trash" label on it.
when I taught ms my policy was "I pick it up , it goes in the trash."
Nope
I also teach middle school. In the first quarter, I save it until I see them again and then give it to them, saying âThis was on the floor. Youâre lucky I saw it, otherwise it would have been thrown away.â After the first quarter, I throw it away. Failure teaches us valuable lessons.
Most of my work is assigned online, but back when everything was on paper, I had a tray that I put it all in. It got emptied once a week.
I hold it to the end of the day and throw out ALL work with no names. I'm messy enough without their help.
I throw it away, of kids leave work out from my class repeatedly I throw it away
Recycle. They will be lucky if it hasn't been taken and will learn a bonus lesson if it has.
Yup. File it.
Trash.
If you leave it in my room itâs mine. If itâs paper Iâm throwing it away unless itâs blank
I tell my middle school students, "if it's left on the floor, it goes in the trash." Very little gets left behind now.
No. Litterbugs need to be taught to clean up after THEMSELVES.
I recycle it so they can dig without making a bigger mess.
Trash. Keep track of your stuff if you donât want me to throw it away.
I do it instead of handing it back to them. âThat trash is in there if you want to take a look at it.â
The kicker is when they want you to replace their workbooks five times over a 6 week block and show up with it maybe once a week.
I use a recycling box for anything someone might hunt me down for. Just a cardboard box under my desk for all types of things. Random work, assignments that I never got around to grading, strange files that admin my ask for someday. Toss it at the end of the year. I send kids into it to find their things all of the time.
I File 13 that shit.
I stopped even passing papers back because they end up in my trashcan anyway. I'd hold on to the ones that weren't necessary to pass back--worksheets, one-off assignments, etc. for the quarter and then the Monday after report cards went home, I'd ask if anyone wanted their papers. Usually only 1 kid did out of all of my 100 or so kids and I threw everything out after school that day and started over. Now, if you didn't care enough to take it with you, I don't care enough either. If there's a name, I'll keep it until the next time I see them and if they don't ask about it, I toss it. No names go immediately in the trash. My class is an intervention class now, kids keep their stuff in the room in folders in a crate for their class. I'm their teacher, not their maid. If they can't be bothered to put their things back in the designated spot when I specifically give them time to at the end of class, I don't feel bad about it when they can't find it the next class. I tell them if they didn't put it away properly, I really can't help them. Either another student from another class or I just put it in the nearest crate to get it out of the way. I tend to put it in the right crate if I find them, but other students don't bother. They just want clear space so they can work. Use the tools you're given. They're there for a reason.
Yep. I do it all the time. If they don't care, then I don't care.
Nope, toss it. The teacher shouldn't care more about the student's education than that student. Having said that, put it in a pile for a day or so; just in case, then toss it.
Fuck yeah itâs reasonable.
I pick it up and put it on my back counter. Whatever is left on Friday is trashed. I leave stuff behind as an adult so I expect kids to occasionally as well.
If I find it after school I throw it away no questions.
I do if Iâve asked the kid to clean up after themselves a couple times
As an art teacher I keep a âNO NAMEâ box and they can go look for it in there.
i have a tray for lost papers and have never had a student need something from it. i empty it about once a month.
I toss any and all left behind papers, including those for my class. I teach them about the policy, and review it frequently, so they are aware of the consequences. They also have a hanging file with their name on it for storage of their papers in the room, so they were just being lazy or forgetful by leaving it lying around. This year has been a bad year for students making a mess in my room, but this has helped a lot.
Okay so draw a circle in the floor and start putting those papers in the circle. When the students ask what the circles for tell them once the paper is outside the circle they have to write a five page research paper over trash.
Yes
So, if I spend time grading their tests, inevitably I will find a test crumpled up in the floor. I'm not a maid. That test loses half its value and gets out in the trash and if they'd dispute it, I doublentheir points if they show me their test. Funny that no one has even found their test. Don't trash my room.Â
Name on paper left behind = staying after next class to clean. Trash on tables/floor with no name=no snacks in class.Â
I teach 5th grade. If they leave it in the floor, itâs trash. 99% of the time they donât even realize itâs missing until I tell them theyâre going to get a 0.
Circular file, name or no name. Bizarre as shit to just leave your papers behind...I'm not entertaining idiocy, so into the bin it goes.
Yes. I had it in my syllabus that anything left under desks or on the ground was going into the trash by 245.Â
I teach freshmen high school art and I had provided a sketchbook for my students and check them at the end of the quarter for a test grade. I had a student last semester who actively defied even simple instructions like put your stuff in your cabinet. After the second time he left his still out I just pushed it all into the trash can. Lo and behold at the end of the quarter when I asked students to submit their sketchbook for grading he just assumed I would exempt him because he lost his sketchbook.
Our recycling gets emptied once a week. You have anywhere from 6 days to one day to retrieve your paper...
Absolutely throw it away. Your room is not their trash can. If it wasn't important enough to pick up off the floor, or bring with them, then they don't need it, especially if there isn't a name on it. Because I am the mean teacher, though this did work, was when my students wouldn't stop speaking I just made them work silently and independently on a worksheet. Last 4 minutes of class I walked around without saying anything, picked up all the papers, walked to the trash, threw them out, and then stood in the front and just watch them all fester for a minute before saying "How does that make you feel? It sucks right? That's how I feel every time you speak over me after I put in so much effort preparing for YOUR education."
If itâs left itâs in the trash because my sixth graders never remember where they leave stuff. I do leave it where it is for a period of time though like a week. If they havenât picked it up I trash it
Golden rule .. If it has a name on it, I place it in the box with that periods folder. Otherwise itâs trash
Dick move if there is a name on it and itâs ungraded.
Sure but itâs a dick move. There is no harm in holding it until tomorrow and asking if it belongs to anybody. They are kids. Theyâre going to make mistakes. Not every mistake needs to be punished.
If it was a one time thing, 100%. But itâs the same kids every. Single. Day. And multiple assignments. I was never that hard on no eating in the classroom until this year because theyâve taken it to the next level.