Name: Thrive! NCHE Homeschool Conference
Start: 2025-05-22T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-05-24T23:59:59-05:00
Location: Winston-Salem, NC

This topic has 8 replies, 6 voices, and was last updated 16 years, 11 months ago by Jimmie.

Viewing 9 posts - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)

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June 4, 2008 at 2:12 am
christina
Member
I’m not sure if this is the right spot for this, but was wondering how many use lapbooks in their CM education? I have a VERY visual/artist in my family…8yo DD, and I was thinking lapbooks could be beneficial and fun for her. However, at a homeschool meeting last night, and talking to an AO/CM mom, she was very discouraging on the making of lapbooks, etc due to the “pointless busywork” I would love to hear people’s thoughts on this, and what you personally have found with the pros/cons!
Thank you!! =)
June 4, 2008 at 3:19 am
JenKeithley
Member
Christina,
I have four children (two dds who are very visual), so I bought a lapbook CD to use for a study of Ancient Rome. I thought it sounded great, but we ended up ditching the whole thing for a couple of reasons…
1)It was a LOT of busy work for them to cut everything out, get it stapled and glued properly, and then use it.
2) It didn’t really tap into their creativity. The way it was set up, they weren’t making pictures of the things they really appreciated about Rome. Instead, they were filling in descriptions of what other people thought was important for them to know.
Now, I am still learning this whole CM thing (and I’m sure someone can shed more light on this than I can), but I think CM thought it was important for us to get out of the way and let kids pull out the information they think is important and not have them focus on things we think are important. A difficult task for me! 🙂
So now my very creative dds, without any suggestions or assignments about it, trace pictures out of our books on Ancient Rome and color them. Then they tell me about the people or things in the pictures. Hopefully, we can get some page protectors and put them in three ring binders. 🙂
I don’t know if this helps or not, but I would encourage you to let your daughters express what they are learning through their own interpretations and efforts. Then…keep their art work safe and let them use it to narrate info to you. I think they will find it more rewarding than a prescripted tool.
God bless.
Jen
June 4, 2008 at 1:53 pm
Bookworm
Participant
`A lot of lapbooking can be busywork. I’ve done a few, most recently Homeschool in the Woods’s Old Testament lapbook with my 7yo. THAT worked well, it was kind of a record of all we did this year. He doesn’t write very much yet and using the timeline figures to sort of tell the story worked well. And I’ve had a child who was very, very interested in a particular topic and did a lapbook mostly on his own about this interest. He didn’t do a lot of fancy booklets but did include lots of pictures and writing.
But I’m sort of leery of the “let’s lapbook everything” We did a few when the older boys were younger and some of the activities drove me nuts. WHY do I need to make a complicated “layer” booklet with a bazillion flaps for vocabulary words? I don’t even like to do vocabulary words! LOL
If the child uses it to do forms of narration on his own, I don’t know that there would be a big problem with it, but if it’s “assigned” I’m not so sure it’s as useful as simple narration. One thing I have noticed is that younger kids seem more attracted by the IDEA of lapbooking, but at that age, it has to be much more parent-directed, while older kids who COULD do the things on their own, at least in my family, have lost interest in all the doo-dads by then and would just end up doing a notebook page instead.
Michelle D.
June 4, 2008 at 2:51 pm
CindyS
Participant
Christina,
I think lapbooking can be beneficial if it is used sparingly, based upon a subject the child has a great interest in, and is not too long in duration because that interest could be quenched by dragging something out too long.
We are more of a mind to collect things in notebooks. It may not be ‘notebooking’ per se, but it works for us. That gives us the ability to expand when we want to and, on the other hand, call something ‘complete’ at any time. They can also use all the creativity they want, or none at all beyond narrations.
With eight children, we’ve had too many failures that have resulted in incomplete projects which can furthur result in crushing that desire to learn.
Blessings,
Cindy
June 4, 2008 at 6:33 pm
christina
Member
Ah! That makes sence! Thank you for the wisdom. DD has a notebook started for the year, (a 3 ring binder) so perhaps we should just stick to that? From what I have been getting from these posts, she could then go into as much detail as she wants on her notebook pages! Thank you for sharing!
Blessings,
~C~
June 4, 2008 at 6:38 pm
CindyS
Participant
Christina,
Have you looked at notebookingpages.com? I have recently begun receiving her emails and I am reading through ‘how to get started.’ I’m thinking she may have some good ideas to add; though I am also wary of ‘fill in the blank’ pages.
Blessings,
Cindy
June 4, 2008 at 7:07 pm
christina
Member
I believe I had looked at that site many months back, but at the time I would have been forming everything and just way too bogged down. I will take another peek at it today! =)
June 4, 2008 at 8:23 pm
Sonya Shafer
Moderator
We, too, like to do “hobby notebooks,” which can easily lap over (no pun intended) to what the children are learning in school time. Here’s a little description of our experience with notebooks.
June 8, 2008 at 3:49 am
Jimmie
Member
This is a fabulous question, and one that I addressed on my blog:
http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/Jimmie/494785/
My basic response is that lapbooking can be merely busy work, especially if it’s too parent directed or based on a kit. But lapbooking can be a tool used for narration.
Jimmie