How to Host a Summer Book Exchange Event in 10 Easy Steps

 

It's hard to get kids excited about reading when summer vacation promises lots of time with friends, family vacations, and outdoor fun. And of course, we want them to do all those fun things during summer break. We just want them to spend time reading, too!

One of the best ways I've found to get my students excited about reading over the summer is to give them access to lots of books they want to read. A Summer Book Exchange Event does just that.

Hosting a Summer Book Exchange Event is a fun and effective way to encourage students to read over the summer. 

Hosting a Summer Book Exchange event in 10 Easy Steps:

1) Establish and schedule a date, time, and location for the exchange. We held the event in our school media center during the last week of school.

2) Recruit teachers, staff members, and volunteers to plan and run the event. Our grade-level team spearheaded the planning and recruited volunteer parents to help on the day of the event. 

3) Get the word out. We created a flyer to send home asking students to donate unwanted books in good condition.

4) Involve your students in the event. We had our students cover and decorate donation boxes to place in common areas and in the community. 

5) Involve the community. Ask small businesses, churches, or community centers if you can place a flyer and donation box at their location. Arrange to pick up donations in a timely manner. Don't forget to have students write thank you letters to send out after the event. 

6) Organize and count donated books as they come in. Parents and teachers worked together on this.

7) Determine the number of books each student will be able to take home. After the collection window closed, we tallied the total number of books donated. We divided that number by the number of students in our grade level. Each student was able to choose several books to take home. *Please note that all students were able to take home books, whether they had donated to the exchange or not. 

8) Organize and display the books for easy browsing. We used tables, but you could also use shelves, library carts, baskets, or even the floor to display books. 

9) Allow students ample time to browse. Teachers and volunteers should assist as needed. We allowed students to browse in shifts. Smaller groups of students led to fewer conflicts and a little less chaos. 

10) Encourage students to read their new books over the summer! 

Or, immediately as the students in the picture below did. 😀

If you are a little bit hesitant about planning a large event, start small. My first book exchange event involved just my students. Even if students are able to take home just 1 or 2 "new" books to read, that may be more than they had before. Just encouraging students to bring in and trade old favorites sends a powerful message about the fun (and importance) of reading. I hope you will give it a try.

If you are short on time or don't know where to begin, I've done a lot of the work for you! My resource, Editable Summer Book Exchange Suggestions, Flyers, and Letters has everything you need to get started with planning your own event. It's available in my TpT store. 

Happy Reading!