31 Days To A Clutter Free Life Day 19: Kids Paperwork

31 Days To A Clutter Free Life Day 19: Kids Paperwork

Welcome to Day 19 of the 31 Days To A Clutter Free Life Challenge! If you want to find out what the challenge is all about or would like to read the previous posts, simply go here.

Today’s challenge will focus on kids paperwork. Although I’m a bit of a paperwork hoarder, my kids are pretty good about tossing papers out. Before we began homeschooling, the amount of paperwork that would come into the home was flat out ridiculous. I don’t know how schools stay within budget with the amount of papers and ink they use! I personally try to keep the amount of papers we use to a minimum by doing a lot of our school work electronically. When we do create artwork or written projects, I determine whether it’s truly necessary to keep and if it’s not, out it goes.

Each of my kids have a desk in their room that offer some small space to keep their notebooks, papers, etc. For this challenge, I decided to tackle my son’s desk. It’s wasn’t terrible, but he had some extra stuff he truly didn’t need.

Here’s a before picture of my son’s desk:

And the after:

It truly didn’t take long and now he has a lot more usable space. I simply focused on keeping the things he needed and getting rid of the things that he didn’t need or use.

Here are some great tips from Ruth of Living Well Spending Less to help you get started:

1. Collect and sort. Gather all of the kid paperwork and artwork that may be floating around the house. Create an in-box in your family command center for permission slips and “need attention” items, and a spot on your child’s desk or work area for homework and current projects. Select a few very special artwork items to keep for display, then scan any other items you want to remember but not necessarily keep.

 2. Review. Plan a weekly review system for younger children and nightly for older children, to assess the contents of your child’s backpack, communication from daycare, school and preschool, artwork and creative projects.

 3. Take immediate action. Handle items such as permission slips as soon as they come in and return them to school the very next day.

Read more at Living Well Spending Less.

If you need more tips to help you tackle your kids bedrooms, check out this post for additional ideas:

If you want to join in or would like more tips for today’s challenge, check out Living Well Spending Less for more details. Let me know if you are also doing the challenge so we can cheer each other on!

Looking for more organization ideas? Check out the following: