I've struggled with keeping my classroom library organized for years.
The kids are in such a hurry when they put books away, the tubs often look like this:
If you look closely, you'll see that not only are the books a mess, but hardly any of them go with the topic Information Books About Sports! Hopefully, the reason they're in such a hurry is because they're excited about the other books! (One can hope!)
What do I do?
I have the kids re-organize the books!
Yep, about once a month, I take about a half hour of my reading time to have the children re-organize the books.
Yes, as you guessed, at first it's chaos. But once I get them going, it's amazing!
The Benefits:
1. The children learn to organize books.
2. The children have ownership of the book tubs.
3. The children learn the find the author of the books on the cover and on the title page.
4. The children usually find interesting books they didn't realize were in the classroom library!
Plus, the tubs now look like this: