Teacher builds interactive desks for his class to enhance student’s success

LAURENS COUNTY, Georgia (41NBC/ WMGT) – Pencils and paper are a thing of the past for a classroom in Laurens County. A teacher spent his summer ‘constructing’ an idea to help his students succeed.

These aren’t your ordinary desks.

“The desks are cool and makes learning more fun and easier. It’s not as complicated as sitting in them old desks,” Jayden Giles, a 5th grader at Southwest Laurens Elementary School, said.

Matt Taylor, a 5th grade teacher at Southwest Laurens Elementary School.

“I’m a visual person, so I took my plan and expanded it from there,” Taylor said.

When students enter his room, they’re trading their pencils in for dry erase markers.

“I can sit in my seat and work on the dry erase board or come down here and work on the chalkboard,” Zyah Walker, one of Taylor’s students, said.

Taylor spent the summer building these five interactive-standing desks, all on his own dime.

“I did it for them. You can see the energy behind me. It’s proven to be a success,” he said.

Students have a 2×2-foot working space. The top, dry erase board and the front, a chalkboard.

Taylor says the desks help with group interaction and contributes to going green.

“My goal was to try and be 50-percent paperless this year in my room, without pencils, without paper. Most of our stuff goes on Google Classroom,” Taylor said.

Student Johnte Allen says it even helps with getting rid of ants in the pants.

“Makes learning fun and doesn’t make me feel like I need to stay in one place and I can move around if I need to,” Allen said.

The project took about two weeks. Taylor says cleaning the sawdust took another week.

“But, it’s clean now. Except the rainbow dust from the chalk,” he said.

Taylor built the desks directly in his classroom. There’s different size stools for students of different heights.