lexi Posted February 4, 2012 Share Posted February 4, 2012 Ok, our library is not great......so I'm starting my own collection. :D I know many of you have home libraries so tell me how you organize them! I'm losing books and buying doubles. I want software or something online to help catalog the books. But I want more than just a catalog of my books, I want to be able to categorize them by the grade we read them or by the Tapestry year and level. I also want to be able to search or sort the books in my collection by these categories so I can know which books I need when. Does something like this exist? What do you use? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngelBee Posted February 4, 2012 Share Posted February 4, 2012 Taking notes. I know people have discussed a cheep scanner. I think you can sort by tags. ??? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nmoira Posted February 4, 2012 Share Posted February 4, 2012 Fiction we alphabetize by author, and the rest is broadly grouped by subject. All our (non-picture book) children's books are in LibraryThing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shelly in the Country Posted February 4, 2012 Share Posted February 4, 2012 I enter every new book purchase I make into Homeschool Tracker Plus. I categorize them in the "Grade Level" field. For example, if I buy a book for TOG, I list it as "Year 3 LG" or "Year 2 D" in the field that asks for the book's grade level. It also lets you categorize your books by school subject, but I haven't played around with trying to generate a list from that field. I like that I can enter my new purchases by typing in the ISBN number. The book list is searchable, and I try to check it before making a new purchase to avoid buying doubles of something I have already. (I have been known to forget that, though.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Down_the_Rabbit_Hole Posted February 4, 2012 Share Posted February 4, 2012 Biggest thing is organization of your books on shelves. I know what is on my shelves and where it is. Our library is arranged as follows Biographies are alphabetized by last name of person Fiction, alphabetized by author last name Atlas Dictionaries Thesaurus Encyclopedias Bible Myths and Legends Poems and plays Music Art Games and Puzzles Archeology Prehistoric and Ice Age Egypt Greece Rome Celtic China Pirates American History starting with Aztecs/Mayans/Incas Do it yourself Cookbooks Ships, Planes, Cars Geology Fossils Dinosaurs Botany Insects Fish Reptiles Mammals Human Biology Microscope Chemistry Pg\hysics Stars Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MomatHWTK Posted February 4, 2012 Share Posted February 4, 2012 librarything.com is the site I use. I purchased a cuecat scanner that works with librarything's system. Not all books will scan, but it does help speed up the process if you have a large stack. If you are well organized, you can enter a personal note or tag with each book indicating it's location in your library. I would love to use the Dewey Decimal System for my books, but have never made it that far. We just did a remodel and moved lots of stuff around, so I am taking advantage of the opportunity to file the picture books alphabetically by author. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chepyl Posted February 4, 2012 Share Posted February 4, 2012 You can just use Excel. With the data sort feature, you can reorganize with a click. Just make a column for title, author, grade, subject, whatever else you want. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stm4him Posted February 4, 2012 Share Posted February 4, 2012 We also just have sections set up using IKEA Expedit bookshelves. I can easily see and find what we have. I have sections for earth science and astronomy, birds and bugs, sea creatures, health/anatomy, land animals (including dinosaurs), nature study, science encyclopedias, physics/chemistry, and animal stories. My history topics are grouped the way VP does them. I have a section for World Geography and one for US Geography. I have one section for atlases, dictionaries, and thesauruses. I have picture books grouped by author. I have a biography section for boys grouped by last name and one for women and one for biography books about various people. I have one section for poetry. And I have one section for extra resources for myself in foreign language, language arts, math, memory work, etc. I also have one section on practical skills for kids. I have a section of chapter books also grouped by author. And I have a few sections on Bible related books and reference books. I have a row of encyclopedias and other reference book sets I've picked up here and there used. I have one section of books of book lists. I'm sure I'm forgetting something but you get the idea. My kids just know where they sections are though I don't have them labeled b/c they change every once in awhile to adjust to adding more books. If they can't find something they come and ask me and if the little kids get something out (or the big kids for that matter) and they can't figure out exactly where it goes they put it in a basket and about once a week or so I go and put them back.......All books are to be returned when they are finished and they are not supposed to have more than one or two out at a time but my son sometimes breaks this rule :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frugalmama Posted February 4, 2012 Share Posted February 4, 2012 librarything.com is the site I use. I purchased a cuecat scanner that works with librarything's system. Not all books will scan, but it does help speed up the process if you have a large stack. If you are well organized, you can enter a personal note or tag with each book indicating it's location in your library. I would love to use the Dewey Decimal System for my books, but have never made it that far. We just did a remodel and moved lots of stuff around, so I am taking advantage of the opportunity to file the picture books alphabetically by author. :iagree::iagree::iagree::iagree::iagree: I use Librarything and LOVE LOVE LOVE it. You can do dewey decimal with LT but setting it up into that setup is a BIG job. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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