Tips For Building and Maintaining Classroom Posters

I love posters for my classroom and so do my students. I have spent hours making posters by hand and eventually spent my share of money on them too. It looked something like this:

Year one: Lots of time hand making posters with markers and large paper.

Year two: Lots of time designing posters and waiting for sales to print them.

Year three: Lots of time updating posters and placing them for sale.

A solid poster collection involves sweat and money. That is why it stings when one of them tears on the corner or gets damaged from a storage method. There are several things I wish I did not have to learn the hard way about building my poster collection. That is why I pass these tips on to you.

Tips for using posters in the classroom

Print Posters Professionally

Professionally printed posters will last for a long time, even without lamination. They are more vibrant and can also be more organized, detailed, and helpful. To get professionally printed posters you have several options: buy the full service. There are plenty of classroom poster designs for sale at many retailers, from Amazon, to Red Bubble, to Teaching More Than Math. DIY design and pay for printing. Design whatever the classroom needs and print it at any poster printing place (Walgreens, Vista Print, Costco). Buy the design and pay for the printing. That is what I am offering. Choose from a selection of math and classroom posters files and print where you choose (or don't print and use the poster file in your virtual classroom). Each option has its own benefits. Learn more about using digital poster files to cut costs.

Save on Printing

I make my posters and print them during hot sales. I save a ton of money doing this. I started making posters because I really could not find the posters I was looking for and was not loving my hand drawn designs. I love buying things at a discount price, so I spent some time looking for the best printing deals. It turns out that Walgreens is the best deal.

Walgreens’ regular prices are comparable to most other places, but they beat out the competition because if you have a store locally you do not have to pay for shipping. Additionally, they always have a sale. Always! Sometimes the sale is 40%, sometimes 50%, and several times a year the sale is 75% off. I panic when the sale is 75% because its a wonderful opportunity to complete my poster wish list, but the sale is never around for long.

Use Large Posters

I am a fan of large posters. I print skill posters at the 20 x 30 inch size. Students can read large posters from anywhere in the room. I have a section of wall where I place all of my skill posters. I add one at a time as we learn the skill. This way students do not feel overwhelmed at the start of the school year. When we learn a new skill it is easy to identify where the new poster is.

Take Care of the Posters

Take a moment to plan how to avoid a rookie mistake hanging the posters. Think about what to use to hang the posters. I have seen people use hot glue guns, reusable tacky putty, tape, and extra strong double sided adhesive. I use the extra strong double sided adhesive since my classroom walls are concrete and everything else seems to fall within a day or two.

Protect the backs of the posters. Whatever you decide to do, be sure to protect the back of your non-laminated poster with clear tape. Otherwise when you remove the adhesive there is a risk that the back of the poster paper will rip or weakening the paper. I place a small piece of clear tape in each corner where I plan to put the adhesive. It acts like a plastic protection. Then I place the double sided adhesive on to each piece of tape (never the poster paper). Then press it to the wall. When it is time to take the poster down the tape stays attached to the poster and the adhesive comes clean off of the back of the tape.

Be sure that all adhesive is off the back of your posters.

I made the mistake of stacking posters as I removed from the wall without removing the adhesive first. I thought the light stack was enough to keep the adhesive from adhering to the poster. I was wrong. The adhesive on the back of each poster stuck to the front of the poster it was on top of. The front of several posters were damaged as I separated the two posters from each other. There is so much time and value in my posters that it stung when this happened. Take all of the adhesive off of the back of the posters as you take them down.

Store them with care.

Be sure to think about the best way to store your posters during break. I kept several shipping tubes to roll my posters back into safely for storage. Walgreens packages them in poster bags which are easy to get posters back into. Whatever a poster arrives in, keep it to store the poster over the summer.

Save Time

Time is money. You can save time by purchasing digital poster files that you can print at a discount. Learn more.

I am not affiliated with Walgreens and do not receive any money for referrals.

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