This week all my 1st through 5th graders made their own library cards. Again, this is another idea from my mentor Dee. My predecessor had a Rolodex with all the barcodes for the kids, so it lived on the circ desk and you just flipped through it until you found the right child. But I really like the idea of a physical, tangible card that is all their own.

The kids loved it, too. First grade was pink, second was yellow, third was green, fourth was blue, and fifth was purple. The other side of the card has a label with the child’s name and barcode, and I wrote their teachers’ names at the top left. These were some examples I pulled of the different things the kids drew. There were no restrictions other than make it appropriate for school. The cards live in the library, but I’m teaching the kids to come in, find their card in the special box on the circ desk, bring it with them when they check out, and put it back in the box behind the day of the week when they come to the library. So far it’s worked pretty well, and the kids loved making their cards.

Pre-K and K didn’t check out books at all in past years. I will probably still do that for pre-K, but I might try and work up to checking out in the spring with kindergarten.