Description
Are you researching or thinking about buying a pocket chart for your classroom or home? We’ve done a lot of research on pocket charts, and will gladly share with you what we’ve found. We hope this information fast-tracks your own research and helps you buy the pocket chart that’s right for you.
Let’s dive right in. Do you know what the biggest complaint is after buying a pocket chart?
The #1 Reported Problem After Buying a Pocket Chart
I’ll let real customers’ words do the talking. Each line below is a snippet from real individual customer reviews:
- Sagging pockets
- Contents falling out of pockets
- Doesn’t work for heavier material, pockets falling forward
- Pockets stretched out from normal use
- Cards fell out, pockets droop, unusable
- Cards fall out of pockets
- Words do not sit flush, pockets lean forward
- Not durable, pockets completely stretched out
- Researched pocket charts for hours, was mislead by the reviews, pockets droop, cards tip out rendering it unusable
- Cards tip out due to weak plastic strips
- Pockets started to sag after light use
- Can’t hold cards upright
- Pockets quickly lose tightness
- Weight of cards started to loosen the plastic pocket and folded over, flash cards fell out, not sturdy
- Pockets become loose, cards fall out, low quality
- Plastic pockets are not resilient
- Pockets are floppy and loose, stuff falls out
- Pockets do not hold inserts well
- Not sturdy, items fall out, plastic bowed out
- Low-quality, pockets don’t hold cards well, droops easily, wrinkled
- Pockets don’t hold up after a few uses, unusable
- Pockets slouch forward
- Short plastic pockets doesn’t hold much, cards fall out
- Clear plastic too wide, everything falls out, not tight, doesn’t work as intended
- Pockets sway out, anything falls out
- Plastic pouches stretched out
- Plastic pockets sag out to 90 degrees
- Plastic pouches become loose quickly after light use
- Plastic pockets so loose that items fell out
- Everything falls out of pockets
- Clear plastic loosens and curves down quickly
- Plastic pockets lean out, easily overloaded
- Cards continually fall out, clear plastic bends forward
- Does not hold up, plastic is not sturdy enough
- Plastic so loose everything falls out
- Plastic pockets stretched out making it unusable. Doesn’t hold anything
- Plastic pockets failed to hold cards causing the entire line to be useless
As You Can Probably Tell…
The biggest problem with pocket charts is that the pockets fail. By “fail”, I mean the pockets begin to sag, droop, lean forward, loosen, or simply don’t hold cards or sentence strips up. In many cases, this happens after light, careful use by teachers taking the utmost care.
The Take-Away?
When you go to buy your pocket chart, make sure to evaluate how the plastic pockets are manufactured. Usually, a plastic strip is sewn onto fabric. Sometimes it can be flimsy, thin, or feel cheaply made, so just be aware.
The Second Most-Common Problem After Buying Pocket Charts?
A lot of people don’t realize the size of the pocket chart they are actually buying. Hear again from real customers in their own words:
- Bigger than expected
- Thought it would be bigger, more sturdy
- Small
- Too small
- Smaller than expected
- Too narrow
Pocket chart purchasers are fooled by the pocket chart product images, and it’s easy to understand why. They have expectations that it should be bigger or smaller. It’s basically just not what they thought they were buying.
Take-away: be sure to check the dimensions and the area you want to place it so it’s a good fit. Many pocket charts appear larger in photos than they actually are.
Third Problem when Buying a Classroom Pocket Chart?
It arrives creased, folded or wrinkled and it can’t be uncreased.
- Arrives folded with huge crease that doesn’t uncreased
- Creased in the middle
- Folded wrinkles
- Creased
- Creased, folded, cracked
- Cheaply made, sewn crooked
It is understandable why pocket charts are folded. If they were shipped flat, the shipping costs alone would make the product impossible to produce. However, other factors determine how well the pocket chart can unroll / unfold such as the material, the location it’s folded in, and so on.
Conclusion and Take-away?
Quite simply, if you’re in the market to buy a pocket chart, make sure the pockets won’t sag, verify the product dimensions, and see if you can find out how it’s shipped. These simple tips can save you some grief and disappointment.
Why are we Writing About Pocket Charts?
We invented the 3″ x 5″ index card holder sleeve and the 4″ x 6″ index card holder sleeve. We had an unusual interest in pocket charts but didn’t want to manufacture the same thing everyone else does. Part of our brand mission is to invent and improve upon existing products.
We set out to create a different pocket chart.
Clear Instead of Colored
We made our pocket chart clear because we wanted something that could look professional and blend into any existing environment.
Many classroom pocket charts on the market come in bright colors such as red, blue or black. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with this. We love all. For us, we wanted our product to be more neutral and less bold – it can look great in a classroom, bedroom, office, or trade show booth.
Our pocket chart is made out of a plastic material called Thermoplastic Polyurethane (or TPU for short). TPU is biodegradable, can be recycled, and is commonly found in products like cell phone cases or sporting goods. TPU is not PVC which makes it a much better and responsible choice for our products.
Reinforced Pockets
We wanted to solve the sagging, droopy pockets problem. The solution we settled on after lots of trial and error is to use clear acrylic clips. The clips provide pocket stability, prevent items from falling out, and allow for heavier, thicker or laminated cards to stay upright.
Each pocket chart comes with 15 clear acrylic clips (already installed) to help prevent the pockets from drooping, sagging. or bowing. The bottom acrylic clips are glued on. The remaining clips can be glued on with clear craft glue or removed completely if you desire. If clips break or are lost, replacement clips are readily available and sold separately.
Durability and Long-lasting In-mind
Our classroom pocket charts are a little on the higher-end, but that’s because they are built to last for a long time. We manufacturer each pocket chart ourselves. Each one is time-consuming and a labor of love.
We understand customers want a pocket chart that is good quality, good size, the right fit, durable, sturdy, hangs nicely, has high-capacity and looks great. You’ll find our pocket chart is all these things at a good price.
Common Product Uses
- sight words / vocabulary with cards or sentence strips
- sentence building
- words of the week
- word walls at home or in the classroom
- organizing letters
- word games
- pre-k, kindergarten and first grade classroom organization
- at-home learning
- flashcard practice and review
- daily classroom schedule, bell schedules, daily work
- remote teaching, virtual learning
- teaching grandchildren at home
- kindergarten prep, preschool activities
- classroom rotations and learning stations
- rewards, incentive stickers
