Five Reasons To Try Notebooking

Notebooking, or (or lapbooks, as they are often called) can be a great addition to your homeschool.  Here are five reasons we tried to (and will continue to) notebook in ours.

1)  Notebooking is a great tool for retention, as well as encouragement toward further learning on a topic.  Notebooking is a way of retelling what has been learned in a way that appeals to a specific child's learning style.

2)  Notebooking has no rules.  Whatever your child likes best (coloring, writing, drawing, painting, cutting, pasting) can be included.  However creative or utilitarian they desire their work to be is just fine.

3)  Having control is inspiring.  The less direction I have given my children, the more elaborate and detailed their notebooks have become.  I have also been shocked at the amount of work they will do without being assigned.  My dyslexic/dysgraphic child is writing up a storm.

4)  There are endless ways to add to a notebook.  One of my favorite resources has been this list of suggestions from the Notebooking Fairy.  There are also reams of Pinterest boards and web sites dedicated to notebooking ideas.

5)  Notebooking is fun.  So much fun, that my children have been working on their notebooks in their free time.  Notebooking is fun because it, like homeschooling itself, can be tailored to the needs, desires and talents of the individual child.

Have you tried notebooking as a part of your homeschool?