The BEST Pencil Sharpener EVER!

Let me start this off by saying that pencils are my BIGGEST Pet Peeve about teaching.  I have tried many different ways of trying to manage pencils, and I think I've just about got the best system now thanks to my newest little friend--The Classroom Friendly Pencil Sharpener.  I used to allow all students to keep ALL their pencils in their desk(I know...Rookie mistake), but when you're bringing 50 pencils to school...those get lost pretty quickly.  So I changed my system, and I kept all the "extra" pencils in a large baggie and gave them 2 to keep in their desk.  Well, then my students were either #1--always using my pencils when theirs were broken or lost OR #2--always bothering me to get their pencils out of their bags.  Soo...I changed my system AGAIN.  This time, I decided to try out "community pencils."  I knew some of my teammates did that in their classrooms, as well as some of the older grades.  I collected all pencils at the beginning of the year.  I got a cheap green and red cup from Wal-Mart, and a little jar wire caddy that looks like this:

I put the green and red cups in this little caddy--green cup for sharpened pencils, red cup for pencils needing to be sharpened.  If you need a pencil, get one out of the green cup.  If you are returning a pencil, put it in the red cup.  Then, I had a Classroom Helper job called the "Pencil Patrol."  This person was responsible for sharpening all the pencils in the red cup in the mornings and afternoons.  This was the only time I wanted sharpening to happen, but you know that wasn't the case..........I'd have my little struggling sweeties up there at the sharpener at all points of the day, even if we weren't using pencils.  I can't totally blame them because our classroom pencil sharpener would EAT our pencils.  I'm not joking when I would say this.  Kids would sharpen, and sharpen, and sharpen, and sharpen....and those little things would be down to little teeny tiny nubs, and they STILL wouldn't be sharpened.  OR only have one side of the pencil sharpened.  If they WERE sharpened, they'd break as soon as the kids got back to their seats.

Enter....my lifesaver.

When I saw other bloggers talking about this new pencil sharpener made by a fellow teacher, I knew I had to try it out!  Boy, am I ever glad I did!!  When the package arrived, I was soooo excited that I had to sharpen every pencil I could find in my house.  It was AWESOME!  It even sharpened those cheapo pencils with all the plastic decorations on the outside without it getting clogged or leaving a huge string of plastic hanging off the side.  I took it to school the next day, told the students, and they, too, were so excited.  You can bet that the Pencil Patrol person didn't forget to do their job after that! 

So....we started the "Pencil Prize Challenge."  I told my sweeties that everyone would be getting a new pencil from Mrs. Cypher with their number on it.  If they wanted to be in the challenge, they had to see how long they could use this pencil and ONLY this one pencil.  The challenge went on for the last two weeks of school, and I STILL had THREE sweeties who had not sharpened, broken, or lost their pencils.

Imagine if some of your students only had to sharpen their pencils every two weeks?!  That would cut down on so much distraction!  Not only is this classroom friendly pencil sharpener AMAZING at sharpening pencils, it is also VERY quiet!

If you don't believe ME about how great this product is, you can ask my teammates who already love it OR head over to Classroom Friendly Supplies and read up on it yourself.  You can get a group of teachers together to order and get a GROUP DISCOUNT!! :)

How do YOU manage pencils in your classroom?