Creating an Effective Space for Your Classroom Library
An effective classroom library should support your literacy instruction, provide a comfortable place for students to talk about and interact with books, and be a central location for classroom resources. Here are some tips on organizing your classroom library space.
- Allocate a space of at least 8x10 feet within your classroom for the library.
- Situate your library away from the central activities and traffic flow of the classroom.
- Plan the space so that students are shielded from visual distractions but so that you can view the area from nearly every location in the classroom.
- Create large display areas for posters, book reviews, book swap ads, and more.
- Have lots of comfortable reading spots to make it inviting!
- Make sure that all materials are easily accessible to students of all sizes.
- Include a small group table for guided reading and mini lessons.
- Have a teacher's read aloud chair in a central spot.
- Set up a book repair area with instructions on how to mend torn pages, remove marks in the books, cover frayed edges, or fix broken bindings.
Adapted from Your Classroom Library: New Ways to Give It More Teaching Power, by D.R. Reutzel and P.C. Fawson (Scholastic Teaching Strategies).