Host a Book Swap

My school is always looking for interesting and engaging ways to get families into the school.  We have hosted chili cook-offs, mystery events, book making parties, and lots of writing celebrations.   When I saw some book swap ideas online, I decided that this would be a great way to get families into school and books into the hands of our kids.

But I wanted to try it out first.  So I invited friends, friends of friends, and family members over to my house this past week for a book swap.  All the children that attended were Pre-K to 2nd grade, which made for a nice variety of texts.

Let me start at the beginning...I had to think about the following questions:

•How many books do you want each guest to bring?

•What age range did I want to target?

•Where was I going to put all the books?

•How long do you want the swap to last?

•What other activities do I want to have at the party?

•Should I have snacks and drinks?

Next up...the invitation.  I wanted it to look like an old library card.  There is a great website that generates this image for you.  After I plugged in my information, it came up like this:

Then it was time to get started on the decorations.  My girls (4 and 5 years old) helped me make banners

The day of the book swap approached and we were ready!  When each guest arrived, they received a ticket for each book that they brought.  That helped me to know how many books that they needed to pick out.

Once all the guests had arrived, the books were placed on the "red carpet" (it was just a long sheet of bulletin board paper held down with golf tees!)

The kids sat down and looked through the books as they tried to decide which ones they wanted to keep.

Once the kids were done picking out books, we had a book mark station and ice cream!

The book swap ended with a picnic.  Each family set out a picnic blanket and enjoyed a meal together.  I have to admit, it went so well and the kids walked away so excited to have new books.  This would be a great edition to the literacy events in our school.

I decided to make a pack that includes all that I will need to host the event at school.  I am going to make it free for our Literacy Land readers for the day.