How Many Books Do You Have?!

There are two reasons I spend a lot of time organizing my library each school year.  1. I love books. 2. I teach Literacy. I stay current with reading research which seems to change every year.  Some years we should Lexile our books. Some years we should use F&P or DRA or AR levels to group our books.  One time I tried the color-code method.  I have tried all of these various ways to organize my classroom library, but I have observed that students respond to books that are grouped by topics.  

The first thing I do when organizing my classroom library is to split them into Fiction and Nonfiction.  Then I put them into baskets and create my topics.  Sometimes they are grouped by author or series.  Sometimes they are simple: cats, dogs, horses. I also take suggestions from my readers and they come up with some pretty funny topics! This also helps me collect books that they want to read.

*TIP--I place Historical Fiction and Diaries between Fiction and Nonfiction.

*Even though these are four different bins, they are related. Horizon, Lost, and Stranded series are next to books about Survival.

Again, these are separate bins that are all related: Boxcar Children, 39 Clues, A to Z, Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew are all next to the Mystery genre bin.

*Draw the readers to certain bins by adding props!

*Does your classroom library make every reader feel represented? I noticed last year that my library clearly represented Caucasian and African Americans, but I need to increase my Asian and Hispanic culture books. I added these topics into my bins. I also added a Native American bin.

Students will value reading books about students who are like them.  This is my favorite bin because it has such great stories!

Readers will connect with characters who have families likes their own.  Readers won't feel alone or like an outcast if they can read books about families that are not perfect.  

You can read this topic bin two ways: Family Matters (like they have issues) or Family Matters (like it is important).

Every year I seem to have twins in my class, so I like to have a bin for them!

Who doesn't love books about dachshunds and hotdogs?!