We have a LOT of books in our house- many that we own and some that cycle through our house from the library. I was finding that my kids were having a hard time really seeing the books because there were too many jammed together and too many choices out at one time. I thought that if I had an organizational system they might have an easier time. In order to continue to foster their independence and love of reading, the system needed to meet these requirements
- provide a way to center our library books and also keep them separate so we don’t get them mixed up with those we own
- increase the visibility of the book choices so the kids can choose what they want
- include an easy way to allow us to cycle through books without my needing to heave them around the house all the time
After several iterations, here’s what I have found to be working for us for the last 6 months or so.
Organize by color
I use this system for books we are storing- not actively reading but those we have read already and may want to re-read or just can’t part with. Many years ago, before I had kids, I organized my adult books by color. I really like it, even though I’ve pared down a lot in recent years. It looks beautiful- who doesn’t love a rainbow!- and it is just as easy for me to find a book this way than in any other system I’ve tried. In my mind, color association is pretty natural.
It worked so well when I had accumulated a lot of kids books that also needed to be stored, I decided to try it again.
I am really liking it so far. Clearly our books are up high, so I’m the only one accessing them up there. In a previous iteration I did also try this on a lower shelf. It also totally worked- my kids could easily get books they wanted and put them back in the right spot. There were so many “right spots” because as long a bright pink Fancy Nancy was with the other pink books, it was right. My kids really felt empowered to be part of the process of choosing books and also cleaning up! It was easy for them to find books, too, because the color association was pretty intuitive for them.
Few and Front-Facing
I like to set out a variety of books for my kids to choose from and to cycle those out every once in a while. Otherwise we’d read the same things over and over. That’s ok too but I do like to mix it up. I use this system in two places in our house: in the living room and in the kids’ room. Here’s how!
When books are displayed front-facing, they’re much more appealing for kids. Children’s book illustrations is truly just as important as the words in those books. It’s really what draws a kid to a book, especially before they can read. This image is in my kids’ room. They often use the books as part of their play, and each likes to cuddle into bed with a book, even my 4 year old who isn’t reading. Seeing her snuggle in with a book as she goes to bed is a sweet little habit I’m thrilled to nurture. Here’s how this shelf works:
Every week or two I pop a new set of books up along the back wall of the bookshelf and also a few along the shelf facing up. The key here is few. You might be tempted to jam 10 books back there. Don’t do it, friends! This helps kids to focus and choose intentionally what they want to read. Then they can focus more deeply on that book. If you find your family reading more often (hello, pandemic + snow), cycle through them more often to change it up.
On my kids’ shelf there’s a mix of leveled readers, picture books, board books, and graphic novels, selected based on their favorites. We rotate these out every couple of weeks, depending on how quickly they’re working through the current stacks.
Book Bins
This is our living room bookcase downstairs. The set up here is that each kid has a shelf for books designated with their photo. Each shelf has a few vertical front-facing books and a few books placed on the shelf that are upward facing. Each kid’s shelf has books that are oriented to their level and interests. The big show stoppers here are the big bins. The bin on the left is where I keep our library books and the right is books we own. The bins allow us to have a fresh set of books to cycle through that are easy to access and add to the shelf when we’re ready for a refresh.
How it all works together
About once a month I’ll go to the rainbow shelf from the first set of pictures and choose 15-30 books that we own that we’ll want to read in the next month. I’ll put them in the big basket. Some of them will come upstairs and go on the kids’ bedroom shelf. Then the kids or I will rotate through those throughout the month.
Whenever we go to the library I update the books in the library bin, returning some and replenishing some on the bookshelf.
When we have books we are done reading for a while, I’ll add them to the rainbow storage shelf until we’re ready for them again.
This works with any set up!
I shared our system with our 3 shelf locations. To be honest, in some ways it would be much easier if I didn’t rotate between 3 locations. In my ideal situation I could have all of our rainbow book storage and our front-facing shelves in the same location and then just rotate in that one spot. I could do that now but I think the shelves would look too dense with just books everywhere. I know this can a beautiful look but not what I’m going for in this space in our home and not what would work visually for my kids to be able to pick something without being overwhelmed.
Happy organizing, friends!