Media Center Archives - So Blessed to Be a Teacher

(EVEN MORE!) Freebies for Your School Library on Teachers Pay Teachers!

(Disclosure: This blog post contains several affiliate links, and if you click through and make a purchase, I will receive compensation at no additional cost to you.)

(Note: This blog post also contains NUMEROUS just-because-I-love-you links to MANY free products on Teachers Pay Teachers, and if you click through and download the free products, nothing particularly exciting happens for me, but you get the FREE TpT resources! Wahoo!)

So…I’m sorry it has been a really, really long time since I’ve published a post. I’ve been, you know, teaching and momming and stuff.

And then, when I didn’t write for awhile, I felt like I needed to prove that I was not a total blog delinquent by making sure my next post was worth the long wait…

…and…here it is! It’s time for another list of FREE PRODUCTS that you can find on TpT and use in your school library. I have over 50 goodies to show you today! (If you’ve missed my other lists of freebies, click here and here to cash in on over 80 other free TpT products available for librarians!)

I’m back! Let the freebie spree commence! YEAH!

Makerspace / STEAM

Here’s a quick and easy and science-y activity that your students can try in your makerspace! Teaching Tidbits and More with Jamie designed this freebie that lets kids experiment with making 3-D shapes out of card stock and seeing which shape is best at holding up books. It’s a great challenge for the library, since you probably have a book or two kicking around! 🙂

And here’s a super fun STEM challenge for the media center – Build a Gingerbread Man Trap by Smart Chick. It would work well with so many gingerbread-themed read aloud books!

Looking for a way to keep track of what’s going on in your makerspace? That Library Media Teacher has created this free product that includes both printable and digital surveys that students can fill out to share what types of activities they explore when they visit the makerspace!

Coding

Get your little library learners’ minds ready for coding with this hot dog themed offline coding activity by iGameMom STEM Learning!

And here’s another free activity courtesy of Teaching with Jackie. This one is just spectacular for practicing coding skills without devices. I tried it with my first grade students last year and I could almost see the lightbulbs lighting up above their heads as they started to understand the basic idea of coding!

If you want to take screen-free coding to the next level, you’ve got to try this free resource by Tess the Krafty Teacher. This product will help you get started with using a Code & Go Mouse to teach your students about coding! She also has another awesome freebie that’ll get you going with Bee Bots.

TTS Bee-Bot Programmable and Rechargeable Robot

When you’re ready for your students to begin with online coding activities, check out this freebie from Mrs. J in the Library, which will help you get your students started with Scratch and Lightbot!

Library Rules and Etiquette

Kids love the “David” books by David Shannon! This printable activity by Little Miss Librarian helps students to think about proper library procedures by inviting the students to imagine that David takes a trip to the library! Your beginning-of-the-year review of library rules can be so much fun as your kids can imagine good choices and bad choices that David might make at the library!

Using a Card Catalog

Practicing with an online card catalog is a must in the library today. Help your upper elementary students gain proficiency with a card catalog with this free product from That Library Media Teacher. (After all, the better they are at finding stuff in the library, the less you have to find for them!)

And here is another free resource that can help your students as they use the card catalog! That Library Girl has put together a free form that will assist your kiddos by giving them an easy way to record the information they find when they look up a book.

Dewey Decimal System

Here is a free printable by Pooley Productions that can be used when your students study the Dewey Decimal System!

For the Little Guys and Gals

This is a derivative of an image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Give your younger students a chance to practice with a basic table of contents with this freebie by Christine Reed!

This free activity by Katie Blair Young asks students to figure out whether books are fiction or nonfiction and why. It’s great for reviewing fiction and nonfiction with your littlest library students!

ABC Order

With this autumn-themed alphabetical order freebie by Differentiation Station Creations, your students can practice the essential library skill of using ABC order!

Or, during the holiday season, your students can try this alphabetical order resource by Bright Buttons! 🎅

And Deanna Cappucci has designed a cute free product so that your students can practice ABC order by alphabetizing each other’s names! (In the library, I could see this working well with first AND last names so that kids can get the idea of alphabetizing books by authors’ last names!)

Students can practice alphabetizing to the 2nd letter with this Earth Day ABC order freebie, available in More than Math by Mo’s store.

And here is a fantastic set of ABC order task cards! Thanks for the freebie, Erin J Murray!

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Research and Reference Books

This printable activity by Teaching with Tamara allows kids to practice their dictionary skills while looking up some homonyms. When I SAW this resource, I knew it would be JUST RIGHT for this CURRENT blog post! 🙂

3…2…1…blastoff! Give your kids a chance to practice their research skills and learn about the planets with this freebie by Imaginative Teacher! Students could use this activity to practice with encyclopedias, and the product also includes a list of suggested websites the kids can use to research this topic!

Or your students could use reference books, along with other library resources, to do some totally fun animal research with this free product from The Library Patch!

Book Review Activities

Asking your students to recommend books to classmates can get kids excited about checking out books from the school library. Here is a cute Halloween-themed book review template designed by Kim Miller that you can have your students fill out to share their favorite library books with their friends!

Looking for other book review options? Here is another great and free book review form by Amanda Rose Resources! Or try this book review freebie by Josie’s Place!

Fun and Fantastic Stuff

Many students love to color, so it’s wonderful to have reading-themed coloring pages on hand for your fast finishers. Here is a great coloring sheet for your library by EveryLittleThing!

I don’t know about you, but I have a few students who are constantly telling me, “I forgot it was library day! I didn’t bring my book!” The Swamped Teacher has developed a freebie that will help with this very situation. By printing out these reminders and making them into magnets to send home with your students, you’ll help students and families remember to return library books!

Do you want to get your library students curious about some of your favorite books? This free, printable sign by Library Learners will give you an excuse to start chatting it up about a favorite title!

Here are some simple, cute, FREE forms you can send home with your students who have done an excellent job in the library. This freebie by Andrea Walkup makes it so easy to acknowledge students for good choices in the media center.

This free product from The Librarian’s Literature Links gives you a super-easy way to give classroom teachers information about what went on in your library class each week. The form includes a spot to point out star students, students who struggled, and students with overdue library books, as well as some basic information about what you did with the whole class. I’m planning to try using these in my school library this year!

Bookmarks

For a FREE, cute, and library-ish birthday gift for your students, how about these free birthday bookmarks, courtesy of Library Learners?!

ElementaryVibes has designed these free bookmarks featuring the Good Egg, the Cool Bean, and their friends. (How adorbs!)

Here are some lovely bookmarks you can personalize with your students’ names by The Organised Teacher Collective!

Perfect for your first day of library – here’s a set of reading-themed bookmarks by Brittany W!

Here are super cute animal-themed printable bookmarks, by Nikki and Nacho, and some adorable ocean-themed printable bookmarks by Let’s Learn S’more!

When you are teaching your students about “Just Right” books, Little Mrs. M has three varieties of free, printable bookmarks that you can give to your students. She’s got free Valentine’s Day themed bookmarks, free St. Patrick’s Day themed bookmarks, and free spring-themed bookmarks! Wahoo!

And…the seasonal bookmark fun continues! Check out these free, printable, Christmas-themed bookmarks by I Teach! And these free, printable, 100th-day-of-school-themed bookmarks by Michelle Dupuis Education! And how about these free, printable, Earth Day-themed bookmarks by Let’s Learn S’More!

Library Decor

Get a start on decorations for the fall with this autumn-themed reading poster by AJ Amazing!

Next, from Librarian Vickie, we have some posters that you can use to teach your students about different genres!

Decorate the walls of your library with these great library freebies – a set of reading quotes posters by Alexandra Stewart and a set of library-themed posters by BlackCoffeeBlackNails!

Encourage your library students to read with this printable “READ” banner set by Josie’s Place! Or here’s a “READ” poster set by Erin E Townsend!

And for more all-year-long-decoration fun, you can download this free product from Primary Teacher Solutions by Mark Johnson. These posters show children reading during each of the twelve months of the year!

And…here’s a free product from my store that you can use to decorate your library! I call these “Strive Stars” because I’m hoping that they will inspire kids to strive to do great things. This set includes nine printable pages, each containing a large star with an encouraging message along with a smaller blank star (just to make your display more visually appealing). Designed to save ink but still make a colorful display, these understated black-and-white stars can be printed on bright printer paper before you cut them out. (I like me some Astrobrights, but any colorful paper will work!) The set includes some stars that have a Christian theme as well as some with messages that would work in any school setting.

Clip Art

Teacher-librarians always need book clip art for different projects, so download this free clip art by Allison Fors that includes opened and closed books!

And here is some gorgeous clip art of kids reading by SchoolBoxTreasures! Perfect for library newsletters, overdue slips, worksheets, or whateva!

Let’s Hear it for Teachers Pay Teachers!

TpT really is a beautiful place. I just highlighted over 50 FREE products for librarians, and there are so many more terrific resources available there that will help your school library to be the best it can be. Feel free to visit my Teachers Pay Teachers store (or the stores of any of these great TpT teacher-authors!) so you can discover other nifty resources that will help you save time and increase the overall awesomeness of your library!

**Thank you so much to the Teachers Pay Teachers teacher-authors who gave me permission to include links to their free resources in this post! For more freebies, click here and here to check out my other posts about free resources for your school library. Don’t forget to subscribe to my blog so you don’t miss my next post!**

Disclosure: The banner below is an affiliate link. If you click through and make a purchase, I may receive compensation at no additional cost to you. Thank you for your support of my blog!

Copyright Resources for Teachers and Librarians

This image is a derivative of a CC0 image courtesy of StartupStockPhotos on pixabay

The internet is overflowing with information and media. There is just SO much content out there, and much of it is just a few clicks away! As someone who remembers looking at documents on those old microform machines for my own school assignments, I am, frankly, a little jealous of today’s students. (However, I did get to say the word “microfiche” from time to time, and our students don’t, and it’s a pretty fun word to say. So there.)

The downside to so much information that is easy to access and free? It’s easy to access and free, so kids can forget that it does not belong to them. Just because you CAN copy and paste and download words, pictures, songs, and videos from the internet in less than 5 seconds doesn’t mean you should. And if you do, it does not mean they are YOURS.

On the other hand, all those words, pictures, songs, and videos ARE there to be read, seen, heard, and accessed, and some of them, such as those in the public domain, are even available for almost any type of use. As teachers and librarians, we want our kids to find and use information, and although we don’t want them to misuse others’ creations, we certainly don’t want them to be afraid of finding and using media and information. We want to help our students learn to synthesize information and create new content, all while being respectful of others who have also created content.

With the complex nuances of copyright law and the ever-changing nature of technology, helping kids with all that can be a daunting task. But, I figured I’d take a stab at helping you help them!

This image is a derivative of a CC0 image courtesy of rawpixel on pixabay

Below, you’ll find links to some resources you can use to help your students get on the right track when it comes to copyright issues.

Disclaimer: I am NOT an attorney, so I cannot attest to the accuracy and validity of any information that can be found on any of the websites/resources I’ve linked to below! At the time this post was published, these websites and resources provided information that, based on my experience as an educator, may be useful to teachers, librarians, and students.

Copyright and Creative Commons Resources for Educators

Common Sense Education – The Common Sense Education organization has created several fabulous videos and lesson plans that can help you teach your students about copyright, such as this Copyrights and Wrongs lesson – all available for free! That particular lesson was designed for high school students, but it could be adapted for middle schoolers, and there are other lessons for younger students on the site as well. (You do need to create an account to access these lessons, but it’s easy and free, and there is bunch of other cool digital citizenship stuff there too that you might be able to use!)
Copyright Kids – Copyrightkids.org, created by the Copyright Society of the USA, is a kid-friendly site that kids can use to explore basic information about copyright law. In the past, I have asked students to visit the site to learn some background info on copyright and then take the Copyright Challenge. I would love to see the site make some updates, since I haven’t noticed any changes in the 5+ years I have been using it, but overall there seems to be a lot of useful information that kids are able to understand.
Taking the Mystery Out of Copyright – This resource, available on the Library of Congress website, shares great info on copyright geared for children, including an interesting (well…interesting for geeks like me) timeline of the history of copyright.
Copyright Term and Public Domain in the United States – Cornell University – When your students already have a basic understanding of what “public domain” is, this chart by Cornell University’s Copyright Information Center can be used to help students determine whether works are part of the public domain.
CC0 image, courtesy of JaneMarySnyder on Pixabay
Teaching Copyright – TeachingCopyright.org is a project of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and it provides teachers with five lesson plans and other resources that you can use to educate your students about copyright.
Creative Commons – Hit up CreativeCommons.org to give your students the basics on Creative Commons right from the source. I enjoy this flow chart available there that breaks down the different types of Creative Commons licenses.
Can I Use That? A Guide to Creative Commons – This resource by Gail Desler clarifies questions you and your students might have about use of images with Creative Commons licenses. It’s very thorough, and as you read it, you’ll find links to many other fantastic resources that will add to your understanding of copyright.
Finding Copyright-Friendly Photos for the Google Images Generation – This article by Kathy Schrock can be found in eSchool News, and it’s an awesome introduction to helping kids find photos to use in their school projects. It has a great overview of Creative Commons and also provides links to some sites that have free images that students can use in their schoolwork. (If you are still looking for more lessons and resources related to Creative Commons and copyright, Kathy Schrock has compiled a monster list of these types of resources on her website, Kathy Schrock’s Guide to Everything.)

I hope all those links will help you get started in the tricky task of teaching kids about copyright!

(By the way, the photos used in this post are thanks to the generous photographers out there who upload their photos with a CC0 mark onto pixabay.com – a website that just so happens to be another great place to visit when discussing copyright and Creative Commons!)

Freebies for Your School Library on Teachers Pay Teachers!

(UPDATE 07/13/24: I noticed that over the years since I originally wrote this post, some of the products I listed in this blog post have switched from FREE products to resources that cost money.😒 Well, I’ve finally gotten around to replacing those resources with newer resources THAT ARE ACTUALLY STILL FREE!😊 So, as of this update, everything linked in this post is really, truly, a free resource! If you first saw this post years ago, there might be some new goodies for you…so check it out!)

My last post was about my #1 suggestion for the new school year, which is to join Teachers Pay Teachers. I talked about my decision to become a buyer (and soon afterward, a seller!) during the last year, and how thrilled I am to be able to get awesome resources for my students for cheap – or often, free!

No matter what you teach, there are most likely a ton of freebies available on Teachers Pay Teachers that will be useful to you. But I’m a library girl, so today I am going to bring you on a little shopping spree to get some cool FREE products that you can use if you are a school librarian (or a library/media specialist, library teacher, teacher-librarian, library superhero rock star diva, or whatever you call yourself these days.) 🙂

YOU DON’T NEED ANY MONEY FOR THIS SHOPPING SPREE! If you want to download any of this fabulous free-ness, you just need an account on Teachers Pay Teachers (and joining, is, of course, also free). I have organized this freebie-for-all into different library-related subjects to make your shopping trip free AND easy!

Let’s grab our imaginary reusable shopping bags and go! (Get ready for a LOT of exclamation points! But really, who isn’t excited about a freebie shopping spree?!?!?!)

Parts of a Book/Text Features

Let’s start with a free Bingo activity by The LibraryFox to review text features!

Why not turn identifying text features into a scavenger hunt? Download iHeartLiteracy’s free product to get it started!

Here is a printable poster by Create-Abilities you can display or distribute to remind your kids about everything they have learned about text features!

Library Behavior & Etiquette

You can display these free signs by Leah the Librarian to remind your kids about how to behave in the library!

Ooh ooh! This one’s mine! 🙂 Print out these free worksheets (by me!) to reinforce your lessons on library behavior and etiquette at the beginning of the school year (or any time the kiddos need a refresher!).

Reference Materials

When your students are learning about reference materials, try this ABC Research resource by The Library Patch!

And Sunny Side of Reading’s Hunting for Information is another cute resource that your kids can use to practice using books from the reference section!

Taking Care of Books

This resource by Phyllis Haley has several great ideas and printables that you can use when you teach your students about how to care for their library books!

Here is a simple printable by Night Owl Librarian that you can use with your primary students during back-to-school in your library!

And Staying Cool in the Library’s adorable book care product includes a coloring page and bookmarks to reinforce your lessons on book care! (I literally just used this product with my new kindergarteners earlier this week!) 🙂

Dewey Decimal System

These cute bookmarks by Staying Cool in the Library can help your students learn the categories of the Dewey Decimal System!

Using Call Numbers

This free resource by Summer Pittman gets students up and moving around the library by asking them to locate books with different call numbers!

Book Fair

Download, print, and display this free banner, designed by ATBOT the Book Bug, OR this free banner, designed by Bright Steps, to advertise your Book Fair!

This is a cute little freebie by the Artsy Techy to help book fair shoppers identify teacher requests at your Book Fair!

Support your colleagues who teach math by making your Book Fair into a math lesson! Try the Trapped Librarian’s Book Fair Math product!

Genres

Please try my Genre Easter Egg Hunt as a fun activity to reinforce the characteristics of several genres!

Coding

Need some suggestions on how to introduce coding to your library students? Download this free resource by the Trapped Librarian that includes ideas for Hour of Code!

Bookmarks

Here are some beautiful fall-themed bookmarks by Social Studies Spotlight that you can print for your students!

And some bookmarks especially for the 100th day of school by Library Learners!

This winter, you can make your kids laugh as they decorate these joke bookmarks created by LittleRed!

When it’s springtime, how about some Peeps bookmarks? Here are Elementary Library Mama’s Peeps bookmarks to color!

And…for any time of the year…some cute animal bookmarks by Mrs. Molly’s Menagerie!

End of the School Year

Do you remember that process-and-a-half of getting all the books back to the library at the end of the school year? Here are some free award certificates by Elementary Library Mama that will be great incentives for your kids!

When book checkout is over for the year, but you need a few activities to get your littlest library students through the last class or two, try these activities (in this resource by…me!).

And if you are looking for a fun way to encourage your library students to keep reading over the summer, just download Summer Reading Bingo by Primary Playground!

Library Decor

Now, here we have a set of reading-themed posters by My First Grade Gems!

And here is a resource by Loquacious Learning that includes gorgeous pictures of famous children’s book characters that you can use to decorate your library space!

Clip Art

More of a DIY-er, are ya? If you want to make your own educational resources for your school library, TpT has you covered there too.

Here is some book clip art by Elementary Lesson Plans!

And here is a set of free clip art from DarraKadisha that includes books and other school supplies!

The next freebie is from Optimistic Kids and Families Art, and as the artist says in her description of the resource, they are, in fact, “free bees.” (Bee clip art, of course! And one of them is reading – perfect for library resources! A cute product and a cute pun.) 🙂

Here is some free clip art by Kari Bolt Clip Art that would be perfect for your library newsletters, signs, and other creations!

And let’s end with some adorable reading owl clip art by Clipartino!

And There is So Much More!

We could seriously chow down on this all-you-can-eat buffet of free stuff all day. My list is just a little sample of all the great resources that are available on Teachers Pay Teachers, but I hope our free spree today got you set up with a bunch of printables and other freebies that will help you throughout this new school year!

(UPDATE 07/13/24: If you loved these freebies, check out four more recent posts with lists to MORE free products for your school library: here, here, here, and here!)

*A huge “thank you!” to the Teachers Pay Teachers teacher-authors who gave me permission to include their resources in this list!*

Disclosure: The banner below is an affiliate link. If you click through and make a purchase, I may receive compensation at no additional cost to you. Thank you for your support of my blog!