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Have you ever visited your child’s classroom and been astonished by how organized and capable they are at school? Just how does the teacher get them to follow the rules and put things away in an orderly fashion?

Your kids are successful because the teacher sets them up for success. Here’s how:

· They know where everything lives.

· They are able to reach coat hangers or storage cubbies.

· They know the teacher won’t come behind them and do it for them!

Believe it or not, you can create the same kind of structure at home to enable your kids to take ownership of their belongings and school responsibilities. Put the right systems in place, and watch your kids become your biggest helpers. Here are some organization zones and systems you can create at home to get the school year off to a great—and orderly—start.

Backpacks, coats and shoes

Backpacks, coats and shoes are an inevitable part of the school year. Instead of letting them clutter your entryway, family room or dining table, designate a home for them. Hang a rack by your entry door with hooks your children can easily reach. Place a bench under it for shoes. Once they come home, have them drop off their stuff, eat a snack and then empty their bags.

School papers

As soon as the school year begins, the mountains of paperwork take on a life of their own. When your kids remove their schoolwork from their bags, it’s important that it has a home. Place a bin on the wall for each child to drop off papers that need to be signed,

homework they want to show you or artwork they may want to keep.

Homework station

It is much easier for students to be successful if they have a designated area to complete their homework. Create a homework station that has all the supplies and books they need to get their work done, including pencils, erasers, a pencil sharpener, paper, dictionary and art supplies. They’ll have everything they need in one place, which means no more excuses for not getting their homework done!

Reading area

Do you wish your child would curl up with a good book more often? You can foster this wonderful—and mandatory—habit by creating a relaxing space in your home for it. Set up an area near the homework station where kids can comfortably read. Have a bookshelf easily accessible that offers a variety of reading materials for them. Remember, the public library offers most of the books your child will ever need.

Toy room

Is your toy room crammed with too many toys? Put some toys aside and rotate toys every few weeks to keep things fresh for the kids. They’ll ask for their favorites. The ones they don’t miss or forget about it? It’s time to pass them along to a friend with younger children, donate them or throw them away if their useful life is over.

Command center

Don’t forget to put some effort into creating a system to manage your family’s hectic schedule. Every household should have a command center equipped with a calendar, menu, chore chart and grocery list. After going through the papers the kids bring home, jot down what needs to be put on the schedule. It doesn’t matter if it’s a simple paper calendar color-coded by family member or an online schedule. Find a system that works for you, and stick with it.

If you put in the time and effort to organize your family before the school year begins, you’ll be rewarded with less stress, happier kids and a less cluttered home.

Organizing your papers can be a frustrating, time-consuming job. Liberators with Major Organizers offer tips for getting your papers organized in time for tax season and beyond.*

*Note: The information in this article is for general use. We are not certified tax advisers. Contact your accountant or lawyer with questions about your specific situation.

Organizing For Tax Season:

• Go on a paper hunt. Gather all your papers in one place, then sort into categories. Use categories that make sense to you and your family. Sort into broad categories, such as bills to pay, tax documents, medical, home, auto, etc. Or simply organize statements and receipts by month versus expense categories.

• Decide what you really need to keep. At Major Organizers, we call this process ‘treasuring’, which means the act of separating the important items from the junk. Some categories of paper treasures include:

• Personal information papers that pertain to who you are and where you come from are treasures – such as birth and marriage certificates, immigration papers, social security cards and medical history.

• • Papers pertaining to assets and liabilities – home and auto titles, bank information, and loan or mortgage information.

  • Current insurance papers.

• Know your state’s record retention requirements. The IRS requires you to hold onto your tax return documentation for a minimum of 3 years, and up to indefinitely for certain cases. Visit irs.gov for more information on record retention. Each state is different in what they require for state returns. For example, in Colorado, it is a minimum of 7 years. Check your state government’s website.

• When in doubt, ask! If you have questions about certain items you may need to keep, please consult your tax accountant or lawyer.

• Get ahead for next year. Designate one place to collect all tax documents, such as a file, box, folder or binder. Create sub-folders for expenses, medical receipts and donations. Look into programs such as www.mint.com, Quicken or Quickbooks for categorizing and tracking.

And Beyond:

• Stop junk mail from stealing your time! Sign up with sites such as dmachoice.org and catalogchoice.org to significantly reduce junk mail and catalog delivery to your home and office addresses.

• Sort mail outside. Start a new habit of sorting your mail outside the home, next to your trash can and recycling bin. Only allow mail into your home that is relevant, important or actionable.

• Challenge yourself. If you are having trouble determining which papers are important to keep, ask yourself “What is the WORST that could happen if I let this piece of paper go?” If the document is a legal document such as a birth certificate that would be difficult to recover, keep it. If the document is something that can easily be accessed online and reprinted, let it go.

• Have a system for paper and use it consistently. We will probably never be a fully paperless world, so let’s strive to be a “less paper” society. Invest in folders and label them simply. Some examples:

• • Personal information files for each family member- including legal identification documents, medical history and other important information for each person.

  • Assets and liability folders are for assets owned and money owed. Remember to keep official documents stating the closing of an account, or proving that a loan has been paid in full.

  • Keep insurance in its own set of folders – personal, medical, home, auto, boat, etc.

  • Color code if it helps – personal information folders in red, medical in blue, assets and liability in green and so forth. Alphabetical filing is universally recognized.

• Clearly mark files and keep your system intuitive to navigate. Imagine if a loved one had to come in an emergency situation and find pertinent information in your files. Could they do it with the system you’ve set up?

• Use technology. Major Organizers recommend apps like Evernote and Genius Scan for clients wanting to move their paper to the cloud. The free version of Evernote lets users reduce paper clutter by turning the information you want to capture into a “note” – including documents, photos, receipts, business cards or internet articles. Genius Scan turns your phone into a scanner so you can send documents or receipts to co-workers and clients and recipes or articles to family members.

• Shred and recycle all non-important papers. These include newspapers and magazines, instruction manuals. Remember, 80% of the information we file we never look at again.

• Set a regular time in your calendar to go through and purge your filing system. A great time to revisit your files is at the start of the year, when you are beginning to gather documents for tax season (hint, hint).

With a little planning and a few file folders, your papers don’t have to be so taxing. (See what we did there?)