curriculum-fairA repost from 2005

Book Fairs? Curriculum Fairs? Don’t you love them? I do!
But, I had to devise a strategy so that I could get the most from them. Here are the things that I try to do in order to survive a book fair.

Check with friends as to their *must-have* books. Devise plan of action so that we do not fight 😉

Have a pre-arranged amount of spending money and know that I will stick to it.

Take esky and/or thermos for drinks and sandwiches and also doubles as a stool.

Backpack containing : Sandwiches. Water bottles. Snacks for kids.Thermos of tea. Lego or other toys for kids.

Large bags for books. (Red & White stripey bags) Or bag on wheels. (Gee, a shopping trolley would be ideal eh?)

Wear layers of clothing- t-shirt, jumper, etc. I have to be comfortable. Wear comfy shoes.

Take my glasses!

Assign ‘Miss R’ and ‘Miss A’ to areas. Devise their booklists. (‘Miss A’ takes cooking and literature while Miss R takes Rare, Children’s and Nature)

Find suitable area for younger kids to settle.

Go up and down the aisles so that I can read the spines of books.

After collecting and gathering, sit down with a cuppa and go through them all. Weed them out and see if other homeschoolers want to go through discard pile. Ask other homeschoolers if I can peruse their discard pile 🙂

Sort books by category- HB, PB, etc

Queue in lines and pay. Accepts credit and eftpos but take cash!

Have pizza delivery slips on table for easy access or we starve that night because Mum won’t be cooking!

Have table cleaned down to peruse my new books with a fresh cuppa.

bkcl1o

I wrote this back in 2004…posted it to on my blog in 2005 so I’m sure that many of you have many more great ideas! (Especially now that some of us have a little more experience now) Feel free to share your book fair survival tips!