How do you organize your books?

I got to this site to find a way to organize my books better. Now I can identify them, but that doesn't really help me find them on the shelf. How do you organize your books?

:-) Diane

I have some books downstairs, some upstairs in the loft, some in my room, some in each of the kids rooms. I got a lovely new big bookcase so I can get all my books out of boxes and put away, but where to put each, and how to find them once they're there?

:-) Diane

Hi! I just joined the group. We have home-schooled our 2 daughters in Haiti for 10 years. With no available public libraries, we chose to use Sonlight to build our home library. I organize the shelves by the Library of Congress system. When I add books on LT I use the Library of Congress search. If they have it, the LC# will come up when you add it. If not, you can often find the LC# on World Cat. I add the new books for the year in Sept. then print out 2 copies of "our library" - one by title and one by LC#. I keep these in a notebook for handy reference. Putting a post-it label on the shelves also helps everyone find what they need.

As soon as we unloaded the boxes, I found the reading schedule for both of my boys and lined their books up according to the schedule. Once read, they go on an open book shelf for "Free Reading." My boys can go to the shelf and pick out their "new" assigned book. No problems in finding what they need to read.

I would love to see your explaination. Can you post a picture on here or email me?

Unfortunately due to last January's earthquake in Haiti our library is currently in boxes & the house we are in now is only temporarily available to us so we will be moving again in a few months. If you check my library you will see the LC call #'s, they start with an alphabet code. I start with the "A"s on the top shelf & work across the shelf, just like at the library. I chose this system because it's the way most universities & colleges shelve their collections and I wanted my girls to be able to find their way around when they move on from home.

To print my "catalog" I sort my library-thing library by title & print one copy, then sort by LC call # & print one copy (this copy is my key for helping keep the books on the shelf in order). You could also do an author sort if you want or sort by tags, whatever works to help your family locate the books they need.

For a tutorials & help on shelving:
http://www.library.kent.edu/page/13760
http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/legacylib/callno.html

Hope this helps!!

Coming to this late....sorry. I use tags to identify the location of my books, especially the ones I have to keep in boxes.

This is an easy way to organize for little ones. I used color coded stickers (The colored circle ones you get at Walmart for garage sales) The kids can put them back by color. Mine are older now, so I think we may try the idea above. Hope this helps :)
Christie

That was a huge issue for us. As homeschoolers, we needed to be able to find them when we need them. I don't know if this will help you, but here's our library: http://iliveinanantbed.com/our-home-library/

Our personal homeschool library is arranged VERY loosely under the categories, Literature (Sub-categories: American, British, World, Collections), Faith/Bible, Geography, Home & Gardening, Language Arts (Grammar, Punctuation, Spelling, etc.), Science (Sub Categories - Life Science, Earth Science, Astronomy), History (US, World, Medieval, Ancient, Reformation, etc.), Travel, Technology, Art (Art History, Artists, Crafts, etc.) Music (composers, sheet music & books, music business, etc.), Architecture, Zero Content books (blank books, journals, etc.), References (dictionaries, encyclopedias, atlases, etc.), Foreign Language.

It's not a perfect system, but it has worked for us. We do have books throughout the house in various locations, but their "homes" are here in my office by categories.

We're using Elfa brand shelving from the Container Store and have drawers & files below the shelving units for manipulatives, DVD sets, CD's etc.

I keep my teacher's manuals on a separate shelf behind my desk - with no access for kids without permission.