D is for Dinosaur

alphabet notebook page

I knew when I started making an Alphabet Notebook with my son that it would be a hit-or-miss activity. With seven older childer to educate and a baby to care for, it is hard to find time to time to squeeze in preschool projects. But I had no idea it would be over a year before we made it to the letter "d"!

This is actually the second page we have done for this letter. The first time, we followed the example on the Totally Tot's website and made a daisy. It was a disaster. There was no way to make it look right AND make it look like a "d." Besides, daisies don't really hold much appeal to rough and tumble little boys.

handprint dinosaurs

Yesterday CJ and I made handprint dinosaurs like the ones on Red Ted Art's Blog. He had so much fun that today I got up early today and made a pattern for a "d is for dinosaur" notebook page. He was thrilled and ran upstairs as soon as we had finished putting it together so he could show it to his oldest sister. I hope you enjoy it as much as he did.

d is for dinosaur coloring page and pattern

Integrating Math With Other Subjects

One of the problems with modern schooling is the artificial divisions it creates. Children are put into grades based on their ages, rather than their learning abilities. Learning is labeled as scholastic and non-scholastic. And subjects are divided as if they had no connection with each other. This is one reason many people have a hard time grasping the concept of math notebooking.

We have been trained through this system of artificial divisions to think of math in terms of numbers and equations. And how can you notebook that? But when we step outside of this box, the variety of ways that notebooking can be used in the study of math becomes much more clear.

History & Math: The Fibonacci Sequence

Someone say, "math" and we think numbers. But if someone says, "the history of math" something entirely different comes to mind. For instance,

• how, when, and by whom were numbers first used?
• what did those numbers look like, and how did they change over time?
• what were some of the most important mathmatical discoveries, and who made them?

Think about "geography and math" and you will come up with a different list:

• how did the first explorers use math in navigation?
• how do we use mathmatics in navigation today?
• what do numbers look like in different countries?
• how is math done differently in those countries?
• how is math used in mapmaking or in reading a map?

You might be tempted to object that this is not really a study of math at all. But when you child is able to see how math relates to other subjects, they will understand why learning math skills is important for what they want to accomplish in other areas of life.

Here are more ways to integrate math with other subjects:

• Learn about famous (and not so famous) mathematicians. Mathematicians Are People, Too and Mathematicians Are People, Too Vol.2 are good books to use. (Here is a PDF of the Fibonacci notebooking page from the picture above.)
• Study math as it relates to music. (You can start by watching this YouTube video of a song composed using the numbers of Pi.) Learn about rythmn, beat, intervals, etc.
• Combine math with your poetry studies.
• Use literature books to teach math concepts. The Love2Learn2Day blog has a great post on Math In Children's Literature and I found many additional book suggestions on this MATH Pinterest board.
• Teach math as part of your science studies. Record your results. This Lesson Planet article has some ideas to get you started.
• Mix art and math.

Once you begin to think of ways to integrate math with other subjects, there is no end to the ideas for math notebooking that you will discover.

This is post is the second in the Math Notebooking Series.


*Go to Part One of the Math Notebooking Series*

*Go to Part Three of the Math Notebooking Series*

World Explorer Biography Pages {free printables}

I've been looking through our geography notebooks as I prepare for next school year and have started to make some notebook pages to use with my younger children. Here are some pictures of my most recent creations. Scroll to the bottom for a link to download the pdf file.

World Explorer Biography Pages Download

Update On My Tabletop Garden

The re-growing celery has made it's way outdoors.
I can't see much difference between the two plants,
 although they were started two weeks apart. {Only
one of these plants survived and it did not produce
 more celery. It just went to seed. So, 
Re-Growing Celery apparently doesn't work.}

The sweet potatoes slips are coming along slowly.

My experiment with re-growing green onions
in water is yielding not so great results.  The greens
come back limp, and see how the bulb is shrinking?
I may try planting these in dirt and see if that makes it worth it.
{Dirt didn't go well either. Another re-growing fail}

Here is my ginger "plant." It isn't growing like it expected
(sprouts out the top). Instead, the nubs are growing out
and turing green. Very interesting. Very slow too.
{I kept this potted up as a houseplant. It looks and smells nice.}



 Want to try growing your own indoor garden? Amanda of Hearts and Trees has created a Tabletop Garden Notebook Page that you can use to record you observations.

Our Plans for Science

My two oldest boys will be doing Apologia's Chemistry this year and my 13-year-old daughter will be doing Physical Science. Since both of the boys plan to go into science related fields, we place a lot of emphasis on this subject. I splurged a little and purchased each of them one of the slightly more expensive Avory binders with the clear cover that you can slide an insert into. Then I designed a cover page for them to decorate. Here is the binder belonging to my 15-year-old "mad chemist":

The boys will be using the notebooking and lab pages from Knowledge Box Central's Chemistry Lapbook Journal and their sister will be using pages I printed from the Apologia Yahoo Group files section. I really like the KBC lab forms, but the other pages have way too many lines for answering the questions and take a lot more paper than the free pages I found in the Yahoo Group files. The grading form you see in the picture below is one that I created. 

Knowledge Box Central Notebook Journal

On Your Own Questions for Physical Science

I believe hands-on experience is the best way to learn, so experimentation and observation have always been a big part of our science education. Several years ago, we even devoted an entire month to studying slime. We've been using Apologia textbooks for six years, and my children absolutely love them because of all the experiments that are included. I love how the elementary texts have notebooking worked right into them. However, I've decided to do something a little different with my younger group this year.

I had downloaded the free Elementary Life Science text some time ago from Scott McQuerry's website. I liked his fun approach and his emphasis on experiments, but we had already covered most of the Life Science material. However, when he introduced his Earth Science text, I figured it would be the perfect way to cover some topics that none of the Apologia elementary books address. I also had a copy of Ann Voskamp' A Child's Geography: Explore His Earth (which covers a lot of the same things) and being inclined to overkill, decided to add that in too. We will be notebooking through both of these texts and filing these pages in simple 3-prong folders.

The Many Faces of Notebooking: Math

Math notebooking is a little bit more difficult than notebooking a subject like science or history. I do tend to rely on textbooks and workbooks more often than not. But we do still sneak in some notebooking and living math on occasion.

This year my 6 older children will be using Life of Fred textbooks for mathematics. We really enjoy the way the author uses a storyline in these books to bring math "into the real world."

Lessons will be completed in simple, inexpensive spiral notebooks. The August Notebooking Round-Up at The Notebooking Fairy mentioned some new Dinah Zike products which are kind of a mix between lapbooking and notebooking. I plan to have the children create something similar to include additional notes and formulas in their notebooks for future reference.

My 6-year-old will be using a combination of the free math curriculum made available online by the Centre for Innovation in Mathematics Teaching  and living math activities.  She will also be doing some math notebooking along with the 11, 10, and 8 year old. We completed my Geometry Notebook Pages in the Spring and will be doing the Counting & Numbers pages this Fall.

Math notebook pages are stored in plastic 3-prong folders.