Homework Organizer
by Rachel Paxton - rachel@creativehomemaking.com

Do you ever get tired of picking up your children's homework from
all over the house?

Even when my daughter's schoolwork has made it to her room, it
usually ends up in the corner, under her bed, in her bed, in her
closet--wherever she can find a place to stash it. One time I
let it go for so long that when we finally went through it we had
literally filled a kitchen garbage bag full of discarded school
papers.

When we were going through the pile of papers, we found a lot of
things my daughter and I both wanted to keep. Some of the
artwork I kept to put up at work. Some of the special projects
she's done I wanted to put away somewhere where we'd be able to
find it twenty years from now.

A lot we just threw away, but there were some things my daughter
wanted to keep that we just didn't know what to do with. I
needed to come up with a way to organize what was left so it
wouldn't end up getting scattered to the wind again.

We looked around at an office supply store and found a file
organizer that seemed to suit her needs. She selected a purple
plastic filing box that is the right size for 8 1/2 x 11 hanging
file folders. My daughter labeled the folders with the names of
her different classes (e.g., Life Sciences, Health, Language
Arts).

My daughter and I came up with this filing idea when she was in
about fifth grade. A freshman in high school this year, she
still has many of the papers she has brought home since the fifth
grade. This has been great not only for papers and projects she
completed, but also for keeping reference materials she still
goes back to from time to time.

Copyright 2002. Rachel Paxton is a freelance writer and mom who
is the author of the Creative Homemaking Recipe of the Week Club
Cookbook, a cookbook containing more than 250 quick easy dinner
ideas. For recipes, tips to organize your home, home decorating,
crafts, and frugal family fun, visit Creative Homemaking
at http://www.creativehomemaking.com.