Your child's shelf and the shared library

Your child's books live in two places on their screens. "My books" holds the books they made and the ones they chose to keep on their own shelf. "Books", in the bar along the bottom, opens "Everyone's books", the shared library, where your child can find and read books that other readers shared.

My books and My shelf

Your child reaches "My books" from the tile on their home screen, or from "See all" next to "Books you made". It has two tabs:

• "I made" lists every finished book your child made, newest first, a page at a time.
• "My shelf" lists the books your child chose to keep, including books from the shared library.

To put a book on the shelf, your child opens the book's page, or reaches the end of the book, and taps "Keep on my shelf". The button changes to "On my shelf". Tapping it again takes the book off the shelf. The shelf is your child's own: other readers do not see it, and nothing on it is counted or scored. The home screen also shows the shelf under "My shelf".

Everyone's books

Every book in the shared library was either shared by a family and read by a person before any other child could see it, or made by us and marked "Made by TaleTykes". A book shared by another reader shows their made-up reader name, never their first name.

What your child sees depends on their age group:

Each page of results ends, and the last one says "That is the end of the shelf." On a book's page, your child can press "Read it" (or "Carry on" if they are partway through) and "Keep on my shelf". On a library book that is not your child's own, there is also a small flag button, next to the words "Tell someone about this book", for telling us something was wrong with it. The same flag is on the covers in the library's main list of books. Reporting a book or comment explains what happens next.

If we close the shared library for a while, your child sees "Having a rest" and a note that their own books are still there.

The parts of the library that involve other children start once the updated notice to parents takes effect: hearts that other readers can see, comments, the weekly board and the row of storytellers. Sharing your child's own books with other readers starts then too, unless you had already switched sharing on for them yourself. Until then, if your child presses "I love it" or "Not for me" on a book, that stays private. Your child's Safety page shows when the updated notice is ready for you to read and agree to.

You choose whether your child can share books, comment or appear on the weekly board. See The shared library and comments.

What your child can type into the search box

For ages 5 and up, the library and the home screen have a box labelled "Look for a book". Your child can type a word or two, such as a kind of animal or a place:

• up to 40 characters;
• letters, numbers, spaces, apostrophes and hyphens only;
• nothing that reads like an instruction.

Anything else is refused with "Try a word or two, like dragon or space." What your child types is only used to search the shelf, and we do not keep a history of what they searched for. We can switch the search box off for a while, and the shelves and tabs still work without it. What your child can type covers every place your child can type.

Taking books off a shelf, and putting books away

• Off the shelf. Your child taps "On my shelf" to take a book off their shelf. This does not delete anything, and books they made stay under "I made".
• Put away by you. You can put one of your child's own books away, which takes it off their screens until you bring it back. Go to Readers, then your child, then "Books", press "Look over it" beside the book, and press "Put it away". Looking over a finished book explains the rest.

If a book is missing from your child's shelf or the library looks wrong, ask us from Help in your dashboard.