Anita Silvy estimates that she has read about 125,000 children's books over the last 40 years (and I thought I had read a lot)! For 11 years, she was the editor of The Horn Book Magazine, a publication many call “the Bible of
children’s literature.” Click on over to her website to read more about her life as a reader, writer, professor, publisher, and expert.
You will LOVE her Children's Book-a-Day Almanac, where she shares daily
- Recommendations
- Stories behind the books
- New books
- Events
You can also search the archives by age group, subject, author/illustrator, and genre. What a treasure trove for you and your kiddos!
Keeping up with the books in your classroom library can be daunting! My daughter found an awesome site this summer that makes it much easier.
Using Booksource's Classroom Organizer, you can load your books by entering ISBNs or by using a mobile app to scan them, and your students check them out by going online. It keeps up with everything, including due dates, and even prints reports (so you can see which books are checked out most, which students are using your library, etc.)!
From the website:
Classroom Organizer is a 
web-based program that allows users to maintain and inventory books in their classroom library. With this amazing tool you can:
- Add existing titles
- Import your student roster
- Enable students to check out and return books
- Run assessment reports on student and title activity
Update 9/1/12: Joanna has been using this in her 7th and 8th grade Reading & Language Arts classroom for the past month, and she loves it! I think you will, too!
