Transform Your Library Space
Recently, I’ve been looking back through photos of my media center at Stewart Middle Magnet from the past five years… As I look back over these photos, I’m struck by how the space slowly evolved over this span of time. It’s easy to just focus on all the big sweeping changes we made in the summer of 2014 when we got our Lowes Toolbox Grant for $5,000 and used several DonorsChoose projects to create a makerspace and flexible learning commons area. But a lot of important changes happened before 2014, and I realized that many of them are very budget friendly and easy for anyone to do, no matter what situation they’re in.
In my latest article for AASL Knowledge Quest, I take a look back at some of the budget friendly changes I made to my library space that made a dramatic impact on the learning experiences of my students. I share how you can use these ideas to transform your library and make it more awesome too. There’s lots of things I’ve learned over the last five years of changing up this space. Transforming our library took time and a good bit of elbow grease, but it was so worth it. Click on over to AASL KnowledgeQuest and check it out 🙂
Some ideas included in the post:
- How less can be more
- How to make wall space even if you think you don’t have any
- Why you should play house in your library
- Ways to source new ideas for your space
- Why you should never stop dreaming
Seriously, go check it out. There’s some pretty epic before and after pictures that give you a good idea of how dark and cavelike my library was when I first got there, and how much it’s changed now.