When I first started teaching, a classroom library was daunting. I had no clue where to start or how many books would be enough for my students and their interests. So I did my research (Pinterest of course) and started collecting. I went to garage sale after garage sale. I checked out our local Salvation Army and Goodwill. I also started to receive scholastic book orders, which I handed out to all of my students monthly and after a while I started to rack up points which allowed me to purchase books through them.
After collecting books for months, a classroom library started to form. Now it was time to organize them! I had no clue what to do. What is the best way? Should I organize them by level, by genre, by series, or should I just put them all in a bookshelf and hope for the best. After looking at the books in a pile for about an hour, I decided to do some more research (Pinterest again). My "research" lead me to a couple conclusions. One, students have a hard time looking for a book when they aren't separated in some way. Second, students usually have a favorite type of book and they often want to read other books that are similar to that favorite book. I finally decided that I would divide my books by genre, series, and favorite authors.
Then, I started looking for bins to put them in. I wanted them to last, but I didn't want to break the bank. I'm a teacher after all. After about a week of searching, I came across some at the dollar tree. They had these great popcorn buckets that were just the right size and only a dollar a piece. What a steal! I bought about 60 and started putting them together. I decided to go with the theme "Popping into a Good Book!" Each book received a label that was shaped like a popcorn kernel that had the genre of the book, the series name, or the author's name. I also placed a numbered sticker on each bin that corresponded with a number sticker on each book. I then printed the genre and author tub labels on green paper and the series labels on blue paper. All of this allowed my students to better navigate the library. The last thing I did for my library, was create a list of bin numbers and the author, genre, or series that correlated with it.
When the bins were finally put together, I bought a couple shelves to house them in. (Teacher Tip: Target shelves are about the same price as ones from Walmart, but the Target shelves are much easier to put together.) I also found that some of the bins were too small to house my entire collection of that certain type of book. So, I bought a few bins that were larger. They worked out perfectly!
A-Z Reading Books
Our school recently purchased the program A-Z Reading so that we could test our students comprehension on grade level text and hopefully improve their comprehension using their leveled books. After spending hours on their site, exploring all that they had to offer, I was finally ready to start using the resource. I printed out all their benchmark books, which are used to gauge where students are at with their comprehension using grade level text. I decided that I would want to use these for more than a year, so I laminated the cover.
I then got to thinking, why not use these books to practice and improve their comprehension. So, I thought to myself, "How can I implement these books in my reading curriculum?" The answer was right there. I could use the books from multiple levels to help differentiate my instruction. There are multiple books that are of similar subject written for different reading levels. These books are great to use for small reading groups. They also allow you to talk about a similar subject as a group and use it to discuss different reading strategies.
What you see below, is my four small group buckets which are all color coordinated. This makes it easy for my students. Three of the four buckets have laminated covers and coordinating tape around the binding. The fourth book is not laminated because each unit I assess where my students comprehension level is at and then create another set for one of my middle groups.
I then got to thinking, why not use these books to practice and improve their comprehension. So, I thought to myself, "How can I implement these books in my reading curriculum?" The answer was right there. I could use the books from multiple levels to help differentiate my instruction. There are multiple books that are of similar subject written for different reading levels. These books are great to use for small reading groups. They also allow you to talk about a similar subject as a group and use it to discuss different reading strategies.
What you see below, is my four small group buckets which are all color coordinated. This makes it easy for my students. Three of the four buckets have laminated covers and coordinating tape around the binding. The fourth book is not laminated because each unit I assess where my students comprehension level is at and then create another set for one of my middle groups.
Orange = Below Level
Purple = Slightly Below Level or Slightly Above Level
(Depending on my assessment of their reading comprehension)
Blue = At Level
Green = Above Level
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