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The Purpose of toy and book rotations
When I learned about the idea of a toy rotation and book rotation, I fell in love with it. The purpose of a toy rotation and book rotation is to rotate in toys and books in as you see fit based on your child’s interests. It also can be done in a developmentally or age appropriate way or seasonally based on upcoming holidays or seasons. Rotations help keep my sons play space organized, easy to clean up, and keep things he is interested in, out and ready for use. While toy and book rotations are not a perfect science, they are an extremely helpful and adaptable tool to incorporate into your little ones room or play room. Toy rotations can be done for any child at any age.
Toy Rotation: Perfect tool after a birthday or Christmas
Coming off of a birthday or Christmas with a child can be a very special time of abundance and joy. Which is something to be extremally grateful for. The downfall I have found with these happy occasions is that receiving so many toys at one time can be overwhelming, overstimulating, and can quickly clutter your child’s room or play room. Which, often times, left my son disinterested in the new items very quickly by opening so many toys at once.
So when we come off of a birthday or Christmas holiday we save almost all the toys and circulate them in with our toy rotations over the course of three to six months. Toy rotations make our son feel like new and exciting things are always on the shelf. We also bring out older toys, blocks, puzzles, figurines for him to rediscover in new ways. This is easy with Lovevery Play Kits (read more about Lovevery play kits we love in a blog post here) because their play guides and app help you see which toys grow with your child or how to bring them back into the mix later on. You can do the exact same thing if you don’t have play kits with your own toys, blocks, puzzles, etc. too.
Keeping Toys and Books Organized in your Home
The most helpful thing with our toy and book rotation has been keeping things organized. We have a box of toys that are plastic action figures or dinosaurs, a box of stuffed animals, and a box of educational puzzles and games. I like to pull a few things from each box for toy rotations. For our book rotation, I keep all the books on a shelf so I can see the spine of the book. I will then pull books out that we want when we are doing the book rotation. This is nice to see which are similar or if I have a theme I am going for, I can easily see which books would go with the theme.
Lovevery Kits Make Organizing Easy
We also keep all of our Lovevery play kits on a shelf in a closet. It is helpful because we can pull from previous play kits. We keep all the toys in the Lovevery play kit box we received them in. This makes it easy to find whatever we need as we decide which items to rotate back in for our son to enjoy in a new and exciting way. When my son gets a new play kit from Lovevery we get a toy rotation ready to go. It’s the perfect time to circulate the new toys into the mix and put away toys that he no longer is showing interest in at the moment.
If you do not do the Lovevery play kits you can use a label maker to label your boxes of toys based on months/ages that your child used them. Or designate boxes/bins by color. I have old plastic shoe boxes that I use for smaller items. These items include magnetic tiles, Pokémon figures, mini dinosaurs, etc. The more organized I can be with toy storage, the easier it is for me to see the options I have for our toy rotation.
The basics of a toy rotation & book rotation
How to do a Toy Rotation
To do a toy rotation, we simply will remove all the toys in our sons shelf (the simple montesorri inspired open cube shelf we have is from Target and under 80 dollars.) and any that are in his room. Then we clean the spaces by vacuuming and wiping surfaces and we replace the toys with his next Lovevery play kit box or toys and puzzles that we have, or a combination of all of the above. Next, we put the toys we pulled out of circulation back in their designated boxes/closets. That is it, so simple!
We aim to do this once a month. You could do this every week, once a month, or based on the season. Sometimes we wait longer than a month or shorter based on how we see our son engage with what we put out or based on his changing interests. As he has gotten a little older, we have extended out toy rotations for longer durations. But to change seasonally for example, near Christmas you could rotate in Christmas related toys and puzzles. Or if you are teaching your toddler colors you can rotate in toys that reinforce color identification. The theme choice possibilities are endless or you can also choose to not even use a theme.
Book Rotation
The book rotation is also very simple. Either pick a theme of books you want to stick with or go rouge and pick random books for the month. I don’t like to use more than 10- 15 books max to make it easier for my son to see the books on his shelf. Rotating books is the same process as a toy rotation. Pick the new books, pull out the old books and put them back in our book storage box or shelf. Clean the shelf if it is a little dusty and then add in your newly selected books.
Sourcing Children’s Books
I am fortunate to have a nice book collection from my baby shower. Also, my mom saved my books from when I was growing up. Additionally, I have what I had left over from teaching. But another fun way to do the book rotation is with library books or buy from Goodwill. Goodwill has an amazing selection of Children’s books to add to your collection for a great price. You can also ask friends and family to give your child books instead of a toy for birthdays (see my blog post about gifting tips for kids for more ideas like this). Start small and never feel pressure to go out and purchase an entire library of books. We also always add in our new books from the library that we get about every two weeks. This is a free way to keep new and exciting books in rotation. Plus it’s a great way to enjoy seasonal books like for Halloween, 4th of July, and other holidays or seasons. Even rotating 2-3 books in is fun because it feels like new and exciting books.
Toy and Book Rotations Your Way
Toy and Book Rotations for Multiple Children
But, what if you have multiple kids at different ages and stages? You can still do toy and book rotations in your own way. Maybe each child has a few designated shelves or boxes. Inevitably they will be sharing toys anyway as they play in a shared area. The only note I have is to definitely be mindful of chocking hazards with toys and read the labels for age ranges. But the same concepts for toy and book rotations apply. Keep toys in rotation based on what your children are enjoying at the moment. Keep books in rotation based on themes or seasons too. If your children have there own shelves or play areas in there separate rooms, you can do toy rotations to each child specifically. The possibilities are endless and can be adapted to your lifestyle and the amount of kids you have.
No Child is the exact same
One of many things I learned when I was a teacher was that no child is the same, nor should they be. They all have unique interests and personalities and things that they enjoy. Plus interests change all the time. That being said, toy and book rotations make adapting to your child simple and fun.
Do what is best for you and your lifestyle. The purpose of the toy rotation is to keep out what is most relevant, age appropriate and what your particular child likes. That is truly the most important part in my opinion. We hope you got some inspiration from this blog post for your families toy rotation and book rotation and organization. The main tip is to do things your way and to enjoy all the beautiful moments that parenthood brings into your life.
