Jessica Barwick: September Blog

Routman Chapter 5:  Organize an Outstanding Classroom Library

I have been working on my classroom library since before I had my first interview for a teaching position.  I have always envisioned an organized, comfortable place filled with books that my students love.  In my fourth year of teaching, I am finally getting close to what I imagined my classroom library to be.

In reading this chapter, I was pleased to see that I have already established many of the things that Routman recommends.  My library has over 200 books, it is organized into bins by genre/topic, I have plenty of pillows, blankets, and comfortable reading nooks, and I have a library checkout system that my students run.  My students like to check out books and can easily find a reading bin based on their reading interest.

That being said, there are still many things I would like to add to make my library even more inviting and students more interested in reading.  The biggest addition to my library would be a larger nonfiction section.  As Routman states, "More nonfiction reading leads to more informational writing, which is related to higher reading achievements...In truth, students often prefer nonfiction."  I personally prefer fiction, so of course, I gravitate toward fiction when purchasing new books for my classroom.  I have observed, however, that many students love nonfiction because they are curious about the world and want to learn as many facts as possible.  In my current library, I have a section for nonfiction books, but it is not organized (except for biographies being separated) into categories. This may be why students are not visiting this section more often.

I also want to do a better job of displaying books, either on the counter where my library is or by installing rain gutters in my literacy corner.  I display books that I read aloud to the class and have recently started displaying books that relate to our current units in social studies or science.  But, I like the idea of doing "teacher book talks" where I hype up a book and display it.  It's amazing how students want to read things that the teacher is interested in!

Finally, I want to include more student writing in my classroom library.  Usually, I keep student writing to put in their writing portfolios, which I give to them at the end of the year.  As long as students were respectful of their peers' writing, it would be fun to add these published pieces to the classroom library.  I could also let students publish their free writing pieces that they are proud of to add, as well.  I believe this would personalize the library and build even more of a sense of community to read each other's writing.

Virginia Woolf said "Literature is no one's private ground, literature is common ground; let us trespass freely and fearlessly." (Atwell, The Pleasure Principle, p. 46)  With a well-stocked, well-organized, well-loved classroom library, students will feel "fearless" in exploring new territory in literature.