You Oughta Know About ...

. . . Book Scanner App & Classroom Check Out App !

Happy 2015, everyone! I am linking up again with the wonderful Jasmine McClain from Buzzing with Mrs. McClain to bring you this new year's You Oughta Know About . . . Book Scanner App!

If you are a teacher that has your own classroom library and your school uses Accelerated Reader, then this post is for you!

About 5 years ago, my 5th grade friend and I spent months coming to school on a Saturday to label each book that had an A.R quiz in our school's entire library and our own classroom library. I know what you might be thinking: "cray, cray"! It's okay, I had a stipend position that paid us to do that. So worry not. But as you can tell, that was some tedious stuff; coming in on a weekend having to type EVERY single book title and author on A.R bookfinder, copying and pasting all the reading level, grade appropriateness, and etc... onto an Excel sheet, to printing a label for the book's spine, and then finally sticking all that info on the book. Sounds stressful, right?!?

Well, stress no more! This is where the bookscanner app comes in. It works on any phone that has a camera so that you can scan the book's barcode, just like you would scan a Q.R Code or a barcode if you use Target Cartwheel to find if an item has deals.

After scanning the book, the app gives you all the A.R information you or your student may need to know. Just as so:

Now you will have the book's quiz #, book reading level, points students earn, and interest level of a book in A.R. I even keep an old old iPhone that has a scanner in my classroom so students can check the information when they can't find it on my book's spine or on A.R bookfinder.

The best part of the bookscanner app however, is that it then sorts a book inventory list on your phone for you and allows you to have a list of all the books you own in your classroom library that has an A.R quiz. 

Simple and easy peasy like Mac 'n Cheesy right? Now no more worrying on organizing your classroom library. But wait, what about if you allow your kiddos to check out books from your classroom library so they can read for A.R time or at home? No worries, I got you covered again!

That's where Classroom Check Out App comes in and saves your day! No more losing books you spent your hard working dollars on or forever saved Scholastic points on. The Classroom Check Out App will help you with keeping track of your books that have been borrowed & checked out and to which student.

First, you scan the book the students want to check out so that it registers in your phone's system. It even allows you to scan and see how many copies of one book you have:

Next, you create your class list:

Then, just like magic . . . you are now able to keep track of everything at the palm of your hands! It tells you which student has which books and the date that they borrowed your book. 

I hope you can find these two apps as useful to you as it has been for me. I don't know how I survived the last 5 years without these 2 apps! 

An InLinkz Link-up