Each fall a new group of students comes into my room and together we fall in love with our classroom library all over again. I love how much my students love spending time in our reading corner and their excitement for reading books. What I don’t love however, is that they don’t put the books back where they should go. Now we have books crammed into the baskets and shelves – some getting wrecked in the process. It’s hard to find things and it drives me crazy!
Thats why I have created a very simple and easy system to help my students know where to put their book when they are done using it. This helps keep our bins and baskets from overflowing with books and it helps my students and I quickly locate the texts we need.
Every single book in my classroom library has a book label on it. I put mine on the spine, but you can put it on the front or back cover as well. I DO NOT recommend putting it on the inside cover of the book because it will make it harder for students to locate. These book labels not only have my name on them (so it can be returned if lost) but they also have a picture that represents the category that book belongs in.
Each basket in my classroom library (and teacher storage) also has a basket label. These basket labels have matching pictures and the name of the category on them. When a student is finished reading a book, they simply match the two pictures so that they know where to return their book. Because I use pictures on the labels, my kinders don’t even need to read to be able to put them back successfully! Hurray!!
The best part is that I can easily recall (or look at my book inventory list) the category the the book belongs to, and can find it within minutes. It’s also been a huge time saver when other teachers ask to borrow a book. I found myself saying “I know I have it here somewhere” as we both dig through the baskets of books in my room.
Because each student can put their book away on their own, I don’t need to have any library helpers to keep things neat and organized. My students do that on their own. When I do find a book that is not in the right place, I take 30 seconds to 1 minute to review how to put the book away correctly.
I use the velcro picture hanging command strips to attach my basket labels to my shelves and baskets. This way, I can easily change out the labels as my library grows and expands. It also allows me to switch out holiday and monthly themed books!
You can buy these book labels and book basket labels from my TpT store. The book labels are editable so that you can put your own name on the books. They are sold individually or in a discounted bundle.
If you are interested in knowing more about how I inventory my books, check out this post!
Happy teaching!
Primary Chic 