Like millions of people, we are lovers of books. All four of us. Which makes for a lot of books in this house. Fortunately, hubby listens to a lot of audio books, which don’t take up valuable space on bookshelves.
In our world of homeschooling, it has been another story.
We have always been lovers of unit studies as well. Even when we didn’t realize we were *doing unit studies* – we were just living life. Researching topics which peaked our interest – fire trucks, the planets, giraffes. {Who would have thunk it? In the early days we were actually homeschooling?!}
Over the years, our love for books and unit studies have grown while our book shelves haven’t.
I have had to get creative in organizing and recording all of these beloved resources. Although we have purchased many lap books, I have made the majority of our unit studies. Causing a great need for organizing books, papers, and files.
Thankfully, we have built-in bookshelves in our playroom and den. The majority of the kids’ books are in the playroom, organized by subjects – Science, Art, History, Math, Language Arts, etc. – using shelf labels from The Library Store. 
All of our books are entered into Library Thing and tagged by subject or topic, for easy reference.
I use two drawers of a filing cabinet (which is quickly growing to three) to organize topics of unit studies.
I have filed printouts and charts pertaining to the given topics, as well as workbooks, travel brochures and magazine articles which we have collected.
{HINT: When traveling: the Chamber of Commerce is your friend – even if you will not use the info on that particular trip, it will very possibly come in handy in the future – say, when you are cuddled on the couch}
I have a laminated master in the front of each drawer so I can easily see what fills the drawer. On the manila folders in the file drawers, I have also written titles of books or manipulatives to use that coordinate with that topic.
Digital files that I have purchased or received for free – (via virtual swag bags, etc) are all organized on my external hard drive by subject.
With the vast amount of resources we have at our fingertips, I refer to three sources when planning a unit study. Library Thing, the metal filing cabinet and my digital filing cabinet {aka my external hard drive} . With each of the three areas up to date and in order, the search is simple. And the resources I am searching are quickly found.
Do you use unit studies in your homeschool?
How do you organize your resources??
We do unit studies. Basically (so far) most everything I use in PDF format and is kept in my external hard drive.
I'm impressed with how organized you are. We don't have much of a problem with keeping the older kids school supplies organized, but my preschool stuff gives me nightmares! It is actually on my list of things to do today. I want to see all of the items cleaned up and organized, but I am NOT looking forward to doing the job!
writingthewaves.com
SO organized! can you please come over & organize our stuff?
I only have a 1st grader & all the papers and books are getting overwhelming. need to use that Library website…i love those shelve markers! thanks for the inspiration Jen!
That is some serious organization! Maybe you could come organize my office?