As we embark on our studies in astronomy, let’s revisit a method of notebooking that our children often request…
Lapbooking, or notebooking with foldables.
(Click here to see an assortment of lapbooks or foldable notebook pages we’ve completed.)
Other homeschooling parents have asked why we would go through the trouble of using foldables to learn and record things like English grammar charts…
… when it takes so much more time to cut and paste shapes than to just write the stuff on a notebooking page. With my own personal shortcut tendencies, let me just say that we don’t make lapbooks because I want to do them – we complete them because the boys request it! And if it’s a tool that nurtures their desire to write, I am all for it!
What’s lapbooking (or “foldables”)?
Lapbooking is simply a way to graphically organize information. Instead of writing answers on a worksheet or writing sentences on a blank piece of paper, you use various types of papers, which are cut and folded into different shapes. Somehow, this little trick motivates our three boys to write more.
There are tons of free lapbook templates to record thoughts, facts, and/or summaries related to literature, science, history, geography, math, and other subjects. If you have a situation where you’d like them to practice something like English grammar charts (pictured below), you can simply download Homeschoolshare’s blank templates to write whatever you’re studying. (They even have lapbooking templates that you can type the text into!)
In an effort to build our science notebook, we decided the boys asked to complete lapbook components to record their science facts, narrations, and experiments from the Apologia Exploring Creation with Astronomy book. (The astronomy lapbook shown below is no longer available, but you can find several others here.)
Apparently, they were so excited that they forgot to get out of their pajamas and into their regular clothes. But many of you know that I sometimes let that slide so I have less laundry to do.
Some of our favorite lapbooks are from Homeschool in the Woods. Check out our experience with those here!