How to Make the Most of Your Scholastic Book Clubs Orders

If you have read my blog before, you may have noticed that I am ALL about free stuff. If it is free, you can guarantee I will snag it up. 

I am sharing 5 easy tips on how to make the most of your Scholastic Book Clubs Orders (and how get lots of free stuff!). There is nothing difficult or crazy on this list. It is really about strategy. Some of these ideas took a while for me to figure out, so I hope that there is at least one thing you didn't know about or haven’t thought of yet.

1.     If you haven’t signed up, then you should sign up (of course). The key here is to get someone to refer you.  With most referral programs, only the person who does the referring gets rewarded. With Book Clubs, both people get rewarded with 250 bonus points! All you have to do is find someone who orders already, and get their customer number.  Viola! 250 bonus points for you both! (If you are a new teacher, be sure to indicate that when you sign up. They send new teachers 10 free book coupons.)

2.      Be smart about when you submit your orders.  Scholastic has different rewards you can earn at different times of the year. They change them up, but this past year they have made it where you get $10 free to spend instantly for each $20 order you enter. (Sometimes they let you earn $20 for each $20 order.) It is definitely worth it to…

·         Wait until you have $20 worth of orders to submit them. I am not saying wait three months for your orders to add up to twenty bucks, but don’t get excited about your first order and submit it right away. Set a due date and wait until it approaches to put in your class order. You know there are always those that wait until the very. last. minute. You don’t want to miss out on free stuff because you didn’t submit your orders the right way.

·         Submit each $20 order separately.  There is no limit on the amount of orders you can submit. You get $10 (or more) to spend for each $20 order, so why not submit each $20 order separately?

3.      Encourage your parents to order online. It is easier for both you and the parents when they do this.  There are also benefits for both the teacher and parent. You receive a $3 coupon for each online order and the parent receives a free book coupon to use on their next order. The $3 coupons can be stacked and they sure do add up! When you send your orders home, make sure you include the class code and directions for the parents to order online. If you use the letter to parents that scholastic provides on their website, this information is included already.

4.     Take pictures of free book coupons before you send them home. This may seem like an odd tip, but trust me you’ll be glad you did. Sometimes scholastic sends free book coupons for you to send home with your students.  Before you send them home, snap a picture of them or write down the code that is on the coupon. Why? Parents do not always take advantage of the coupons. (I will never understand why.) There is also some sort of error in the system when it comes to using these. You are supposed to spend $5 in order to get one free book. However, in my experience, as long as your order equals $5 the system allows you to use as many of these coupons as you want. Even if you don’t have a single student that orders, it is definitely worth it to spend the five bucks so that you can use a ton of book coupons. I have used 15 on a single order before. So snap those pictures!!

5.       Refer your friends. Simple as that. You get 250 bonus points for each person you refer. All you have to do is give them your customer number and have them enter it when they sign up. Scholastic also has forms that you can easily print and hand out to your fellow teachers. It is not a hard thing to do, especially when they see all the free stuff you get with these tips!

Below are some of the free things I have gotten from Book Clubs in the past year. I don’t always get a ton of stuff, but sometimes I am very pleased with the loot I get. =) I did not spend a single dollar and received everything pictured for free. Each picture shows one separate order.

I hope this helped give you some new ideas! 

Do you have any other tips/tricks you use? I would love to hear them!

Don't forget to enter my pencil sharpener giveaway if you have not already!

Five for GOOD Friday (March 29)

I'm linking up with Doodle Bugs Teaching for Five for (Good) Friday.

1. I had an amazing Spring Break this week. I was able to spend most of it with my family. We shopped and ate (my favorite things to do) for five days straight. It was great to have some time to relax with the fam!

2. Time for another kitty picture. This was my view when I woke up this morning...

3. Here is my March Scholastic haul. It is smaller than my past couple, but free is still FREE! My kids love Max the Duck and the Doreen Cronin books.

4. Speaking of free... I just ordered a sample of Teacher's Tape through The Mailbox.com. I haven't tried it before (so I don't know how well it works), but I never pass up a free sample! Here's where you can get yours.

5. I finished my Sizzlin' Summer Centers! This is my biggest pack of centers yet. Woo hoo! I had fun making them, but nothing beats the feeling of getting things done. Now I have a LOT of laminating and cutting to do.

I just signed up for educents. It is like a groupon for teachers and will have educational products 30-90% off! How awesome is that? 

If you sign up before April 2, you get $10 FREE to spend! I can't wait! Click the picture to sign up and get your credit.

Have a fabulous Easter weekend!

Read Across America Week

This week we have been celebrating Dr. Seuss’s birthday (as I’m sure many of you have) along with Read Across America Week. I absolutely love this time of the year because I still remember how much I enjoyed it when I was in school. Here is a small glance at our week:

We read TONS of Dr. Seuss books, so of course we had to make some Oobleck. A second grade class came to help us out so we were a little crammed in the room, but they all had so much fun being scientists for the afternoon. I was surprised (but happy) that none of them had made it before.

We made our first glyphs as a class also. I am going to try to do more of them because my kids liked them so much. I found this activity from Cara Taylor on TpT for free! You can download it here.

I also found another fun (and free!) activity to go with The Foot Book from Allie Byrne. Unfortunately, I do not have pictures because we didn't get to finish it… BUT you can find and print it for yourself here. 

We had a little party to celebrate Dr. Seuss’s birthday Friday afternoon. We watched The Lorax and ate these adorable snacks one of my wonderful parents sent for our class. The jellybeans are “truffula seeds” and the goldfish represent One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish. So sweet!

How did your class celebrate Read Across America Week?

While I am here I will also share by February Scholastic haul. It was my biggest one yet! I was thrilled about all the books I was able to get. I ordered my first Knowledge Quest set (seasons and weather). It is a brand new product and aligns with common core. I haven't had a chance to really look at it yet, so I am not sure how I feel about it.

I also received my online copy of Teacher’s Helper from themailbox.com yesterday. I LOVE getting products from The Mailbox and spend way too much money there. I am so excited that they have aligned Teacher’s Helper with Common Core! I love this magazine. It is perfect for morning work, homework, or extra practice. Does anyone else hoard The Mailbox resources like I do?

I have linked up with teachers in my state! You should if you haven't yet. I would love to meet more Tennessee teachers!

Free $5 to Spend at Scholastic

I received this in an email today and I wanted to share it with you. With the code DLD5 you get $5 free to spend on online resources from Scholastic. I love Scholastic and what is better than free stuff? Nothing!

If you don't get their emails, you should definitely sign up! They do things like this pretty often and they have $1 deals all the time. Now the hard part is deciding what to get! What did you decide on? Leave a comment with the resource you got for FREE.

January Scholastic Haul

Happy Monday! We had a field trip today. We had a great time but man, I am exhausted! It was also picture day so our day was very hectic. I wanted to show you guys my scholastic haul from last month's book order and tell you that if you have not signed up for Scholastic Book Clubs... DO IT NOW! There is seriously no downside and I have gotten so many things absolutely FREE. Here is all the stuff I got this time...

I got 14 books (one is even hardback!), two computer games (not sure how great they are yet...), three books on CD, and five card/puzzle games that are perfect for centers or an "I'm done" activity. All of this from one order... how great is that! I might get more excited than the kids do when the book box comes. It is a little ridiculous.

I plan on doing an in depth post about how to make the most of your book orders, but for now I will just tell you to sign up!! They give bonus points (that you can spend on school items) for every dollar your kids spend, plus you get $20 free to spend when your class puts in a $20 or more order, plus you get $3 to spend any time a parent orders online. (I could go on and on...) If you have a colleague that already orders from book clubs, ask them to give you their customer number when you sign up, because you will BOTH get extra bonus points on your first order! If you do not have a fellow teacher that uses book clubs, I would be more happy to give you my customer number. =) After you sign up, be on the lookout for a post with tips on how to get the most out of your book clubs book orders. 

I have finished two new themed resources for Valentine's Day and St. Patrick's Day (both aligned with Common Core). I am really loving making themed products lately. Take a look at them below!

You can find my Valentine's Day Unit here.

You can find my St. Patrick's Day Unit here.

Have a great week!