What's your best tip for keeping all your books organized?

[water2wine]

I was up late last night having a HOD book fest. I looked at all that I had on my shelf that we had not gotten to to see what would fit where. I figured out pretty well my kids reading levels thanks to Carrie having all the books categorized by reading level and genre. I thought ahead for what I would be using for Beyond in the Girl Interest pack and checked to see what would fit with my two highest reading level girls in BHFG, Then I looked at what in the extension pack might work for both my son and my oldest daughter. Then I checked to see what was available at the library and decided if I want to mess with that. Then I put it all on a spread sheet. Are you exhausted yet? Well I am actually excited. Because I calculated out how much money I am saving by recycling to the next kid down. My youngest two will school for the next three years free for everything! And for the next several years I will only need books for two kids who are closely approaching the same level in reading.

So I have fat order cued up. How do I organize it all? I would like to have it so that each child pretty much has their books. I thought about color coding them by DITHR level and genre so you could see easily. Is that a good idea or am I crazy And then maybe putting each level in it's own wire crate? I am the type who is obsessed with having a plan, can see the big picture, but does not know how to keep it organized and accessible for daily life so I need a system. I am thinking long term with HOD so I would like to have some kind of mini library system that will be easy to do and make it so day in, day out I will not have to think.

Thanks in advance for any creative ideas you may have! I really want to be able to use it over and over and not miss things I have.

[netpea]

I'm not going to have much help for you.

We get most of our books from the library, so we keep those in one basket (saves time weeding them out to return them). Otherwise, we keep the ones we own in one bookcase in the schoolroom or in the kids room in their bookcase. I'm still searching for the best way to organize our stuff too.

[water2wine]

And I think I would do the library too except they have hardly any Christian books and even ones of good character at ours. Plus with six I am justifying it by handing it down. If we had a great library though I would do it. But as it is now I see it as potentially holding us up from doing the same genre them all at the same time and I think that is a must for us with six kids...OK so maybe I am justifying for really wanting to feel them, have them, hold them. Seriously though our library only has a few that work for us unless I go digging and screening things for myself. I'm just too lazy for that. But great thing is non consumable means cheap program for us!

[paliz]

I think the color coding sounds good. I'm not much help either as we use the library a lot also. I guess my only suggestion is to look at other things in your house that you have had to organize and take you cues from that. I would think it would give you good insight to how you like things organized.

[Tansy]

I may not be much help... But here goes... I put up shelves in the side of my dd's closet. On the tops shelf are all my read alouds. she's not allowed to touch em yet...

On the lower shelfs are the books she has read herself and has then earned them. In my room in a old toy chest are all the book that will be used. along with Carries reading list. So when a new genre comes along I go to my toy chest look at the list look at my availble books. Decide if she would like to read it, or should I choose some thing from her regular bookshelf.

when she reads a book it becomes hers.. i know it will make me need to buy a few extra books in the future for her sister, as she is hard on books. but She loves to know it will be hers once she can read it. I keep the "to be used" out of sight because other wise she would be all over them and messing em' up, and I'd lose em.

I keep all the teaching stuff in a big box on her desk, that way I can find everything need in once place.

when I finish with a read aloud it goes back on the shelf cause I don't want to loose those either. I don't keep them color coded but since i only have the books we are using out. They don't get mixed up. I don't have to remember what books we did already since the new books are stored away from the rest.

[Vicki]

I'm in the process of doing the same thing!

I've got 2 gallon size ziplock bags with Beyond, Bigger, and Preparing written on them. I've been pulling books from my shelves and putting them into the bags to sort them out according to the programs. I thought that would give me an idea of what I had on hand, what I can find at the library and what I need to order. The color coding idea sounds like a great one to me. Yesterday I was thinking of sorting my books by the genres on my bookshelves, but I couldn't figure out a way of actually labeling them or how it would work. I'd really like to have my shelves set up that way so that it can be easily accessed for our storytime readings.

I'm sorry I don't have a good answer, but I'm glad to know someone else is doing the same thing too! I'll be following along to see what everyone else has to say. I'm in the process of boxing things up that we won't be using now that I've started Beyond. I probably need to go ahead and order Bigger and the booklist for Drawn so that I can get a grasp on how to organize for the future. That would help me so much!

[my3sons]

Ahhhh, water2wine... an organizer after my own heart! I love to organize things... and reorganize them... too. I have several organizational things going on here. In the basement I have an area for each HOD curriculum and its accompanying books, including the reading material that goes with it.

Upstairs, in a pie safe, I have a shelf for each child's...
*choose from independent reading
*DITHR reading
*read-alouds
*audio tapes and books

I put the independent books on a check-off sheet, and the rest of the categories in a spreadsheet according to genre. That's how I covered all of the books in the bookshop up to the level we're at, that is.

In our official homeschool cupboard, each child has a tub with only the HOD curriculum and books we're using right now. So, just the DITHR book being read, just the read-aloud book we're currently reading, etc. This helps cut down on storing books we're using much later in the year, but not right now. That's what we're doing now, but I'm sure it will evolve! I think the sticker idea would work well, unless you have children comparing levels with each other. I'm always leery of that after tutoring children - they're quick to catch on to things like that. Thanks for the question - the organizer in me will be watching this topic with baited breath!

[6timeboymom]

*Darci stands to address the crowd*
Hi, I'm Darci, and I'm an organizational methods junkie.

(notice I didn't say I was organized...I just like to figure out new ways to try...)
I actually started making a microsoft access database of all the books in this house, and where they fit in the DITHOR categories...

DH bought me shelves that are technically the closet organizer things and we put them up in our living room/library and they look like a built in unit! We have them in the categories like this: History books, Bible books, Science books, easy reader, chapter books, big-boy books, mom's books, board books, etc. There's also a shelf of games, one of crayons/colored pencils, and two drawers that home the paper and glue, glitter, craft supplies. If I ever get it straightened up I will post a picture on my blog and point you there.
I am going to make a better spreadsheet, though, since I abandoned the access idea. I get so mad at myself for coming home with a great buy from the library book sale only to find three of the exact same book already on the shelf!

[water2wine]

Thanks you guys. I did get some good ideas here. I need to look at a couple of places in the house. But I think it is a good idea to have shelves that are categorized. I have space but I also have junk. So maybe a little reorganizing and then trying to see how I recognize it easiest. I am thinking I will do maybe the color code thing on the spine with level and genre. I think I may actually file them by genre because the plan is for all kids to be reading on the same level. But I am going shelf hunting tonight!

Thanks for the ideas. It helped.

[MainelyJen]

You could hold some books by genre or reading level w/in the genre by using the cardboard or plastic magazine storage boxes. They fit neatly on the shelves and have an immediate decluttering visual effect. Then you have a nice, large spine you can label with the books stored neatly inside.

Right now our books are shelved by topic -- two shelves of science books, several shelves of historical/biographies (fiction and non-fiction mixed in together), etc.

Great idea about the closet organizer as a bookcase. I never would have thought of that! I am reorganizing our school room and came to the conclusion I need to purchase about four more 5-shelf bookcases (two have gone to the children's rooms, one has been pressed into service just to hold all the board games). I started looking at bookcases and my! the prices have gone up. Hmmm. . .closet organizer, you say? (grin)

[babybryte]

This is not a tip for the actual physical organizing books, but if you are like me, you have a ton of books (and keep buying more!) and have no idea what you have. I heard of a neat website that you can catalog your books on! It's so cool! You just enter the ISBN on each one, and you can tag it yourself as to what category you want it in. Then when you want to see if you have a certain book or what you have for a certain subject, just go online and pull up your category and see! The link is:
http://www.librarything.com

Hope that helps someone!

[water2wine]

Thank you for posting that. I was actually looking for that to post and actually consider using but I lost the link. It is actually a great tip and I think I will need to use it for the future since we are turning into a little library. In fact I am thinking I need to clear out my office and make it the "library" for us. But this is not just because of HOD. I actually want this for my kids to have a little mini library in our home.

[Vicki]

I don't know if this adds anything at all to help, but I started something yesterday that I think will work for me right now.

I made a list of all the Emerging Readers and the units they go with, and also the extra books for each unit--grouped by unit. I plan on pulling from my shelves this weekend to set things up for all of the units, adding in the read-aloud for that period. I may put rubber bands around them or I may just put them in gallon ziplocks to keep each unit's books together. I also have a few extra crafts that I've found around here to add in with some of the units, so I'm putting those into the baggies as well. I'd like to have my shelves set up so that I can just pick up and go with each weeks lessons. Any other books that we probably won't use for awhile will get boxed up until we need them. I need the space, and this is all I can make sense of to work for me right now.

If I need to get a book from the library for a reader, I need to work it into a planner to have it pulled. Now I just need to make some kind of a planner sheet for each week so that I can see at a glance what I'll need and keep that in a notebook for me.

[water2wine]

Hey Vicki that sounds like a great system. I think I will use part of that! I have made a spread sheet. Categorized and determined the reading level for the ones that I have on my shelf that we had not gotten to because I see this as prime opportunity to get to those. I made my sheet by genre, reading level and DITHR level or Emerging reader or in our case girl interest pack and then put story time in there too. Then I just saw if any of the books in different categories not being read aloud would cross over like the extension read by my oldest to my other high level reading younger child. Plus I listed where all the history and Science books I have on my shelf fit into BHFG.After I got it done with it all I realized two things. One was it works just like it is supposed to, and two that the literature aspect of the program really is important.

I have printed it on thick card stock and then I glued it to the inside of the BHFG guide book right to the wrong side of the cover. I am linking all the character material that I thought went well to the Proverbs Bible study in BHFG so I would remember to use them. I am writing what to use each week directly into the day with the Bible Study. I am really excited about that because it is pretty easy to link trait character study since Carrie already did that for me in the guide. It's a perfect fit and it's all the stuff that really is my heart priority but seems to be hard to logically fit in for some reason. Now it is part of our program. And since it is so closely linked to HOD in theme it will get done.

The other thing I did is I took the advice here that was pure genius and I cleared out some junk. Now I have a nice cabinet and some bins with the different kinds of readers, story time, DITHR by level (we have three), and emerging reader. Now I can use your bag system I think I will use as we are reading them so they will not get lost at that step and they are off limits before then.

So now I feel incredibly organized and things are very easy to find. Even though I am off the deep end with all the stuff I want to do. I have it prioritized. We may not hit it all and that's OK we know we have really the meat covered by just doing BHFG so this is all the extra gravy stuff anyway. But I love that it was so easy to link it in and I think since HOD really helps us with time we will get it all done. I have so much more time than I did before HOD so really this won't even fit in the time I am saving by doing HOD. It's kind of amazing me that we could pull off a literature based program with six kids all over the place on levels in the first place. So of course I would need to do a little organizing.

Thanks you guys! I am using your ideas and it helped!