Building a Guided Reading Closet

Let me preface this post by saying I'm pretty sure my coworkers think I'm crazy because I document my days in photographs.  But, I enjoy looking back at things, so I continue to allow them to think I'm crazy. 

Anyway, I've been working hard (with the help of other teachers) to create a guided reading closet for my school.  At first I wasn't sure how to accomplish this until I saw this teacher's website after a google search: Ms. Houghton's Class.  I spent hours on this site OOGLING at the photos of this teacher resource center.  If you click on this link before finishing this blog post, please don't forget to come back!  lol

Anyway, we had a storage closet that used to work as a lending closet, but had kind of turned into a catch-all.  One full day PD day, we were given some time to work on the closet and here is what that day looked like:

 

Then, after many evenings of organizing, it started to come together:

Books are grouped in quantities of 4 or more and leveled according to guided reading level.  They are also labeled fiction or nonfiction, and placed in labeled bins.  Each bag has a card that works as a checkout card.  If a teacher wants to borrow books, they take the card out of the bag and place the card in a pocket chart under their name. 

We have thousands of readers to go through, but I'm so happy with the result!