As we all start heading back to school after a productive/restful/exciting/too short [fill in the blank] summer, I wanted to share a few ‘book care’ resources that I have found.  The first is a parody of Mo Willem’s Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus – Don’t Let the Pigeon Touch the Books by Laughter in the Library.  Note that there are two versions, one by the each of the librarians that created the videos.   I pair this with the actual story, and my students loved it – so much so that they asked every couple of weeks to see it again and again, and on their last media day, I made sure to show them one last time for the school year.

This year, I discovered another video that is a parody of favorite children’s book character. This one: The 5 Book Care Rules starring Skippy Jon Jones is the one I plan to use this year, followed by a mini author study and book talks.

How to Care for Library Books at Home is another cute video about book care.  It features a big and little sister, and also encourages discussion about each event shown in the video.

The Shelf Elf by Jackie Mims Hopkins is another option for teaching book care to young children.  Children learn library etiquette from this book and will help make their library adventures much more enjoyable.

If you haven’t discovered Scooter Hayes AKA Melvil Dewey International Library Hip Hop Superstar – you need to!  He’s got some great rap songs about the library.  One of the new ones from his recent CD Papercuts is “Book Marky Mark.”     His CD is available on Spotify (free membership for 30 days), iTunes, and Amazon.  As a side note, there is a fun DDCS video – The Dewey Decimal Rap on YouTube (another much requested video by my students).

With Scooter Hayes’ songs, you’ve gotta get the kids up dancing – they love it!!

SafeShare.tv is a great way to block the pop-ups and extraneous information on the You Tube site….helps keep the students focused on the video instead of the ‘recommended’ ones on the side bars.

Penelope Popper, Book Doctor by Toni Buzzeo (one of the movers and shakers in school library world) is a sweet story about the importance of book care, and how one small girl rises to great heights as she learns to heal her library, one book at a time.  This print resource also has a set of lesson plans to go along with it.

What Happened to Marion’s Book? by Brook Berg is another great print resource – and also written by a school librarian!  Unfortunately, it is no longer in print, but still available on Amazon and in used bookstores, and has a set of lesson plans as well.

There are many book care Pinterest boards – click here for one that has a nice assortment of resources. 

Here’s wishing all of us an awesome school year!