Here’s this week’s practical tip ~
My blog was birthed because I wanted to share my notebook pages!
Notebooking is a fundamental basic for a Charlotte Mason– based approach.
Some tips ~
- Start with free downloads. Several blogs and websites were a welcome resource when I started homeschooling. Notebooking Pages, Notebook Fairie and Homeschool Helper Online were excellent sites!
- Keep them on hand. File your notebook pages in a large notebooking ring binder. Make several copies of your kid’s favourite pages. Also, I filed notebook pages in my children’s ring binders ready for each lesson so there was no delay between the lesson, looking for a suitable notebook page and their work.
- Start with basic pages and create specific pages. When I created pages, first pages were a variety of blank format/ boxes/ lined and header pages. Then I created specific pages for Sonlight History notebook pages, Copywork pages for handwriting practice, Biography pages, Bible pages, notebook pages with famous artists, famous musicians and world leaders’ quotes for each theme, topic or chapter we studied.
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Start small. For reluctant writers, start with minibooks. A combination of a notebook page with minibooks is a welcome invitation over a large blank page. Kids much more easily write a few sentences in a minibook rather than feel like they have to fill a large page.
- Kids make your own. As my kids got older, they learnt how to create their own notebook pages on MS Word. They used a basic blank template and added their own boxes for illustrations and selected their favourite font. Later, they typed out their own notes. Now, my high schoolers often simply write out their notes on lined pages.
Pop over to my Free Pages for your free notebooking downloads.
Blessings, Nadene
