When I posted this photo on my Facebook page a few weeks ago it sparked some questions about how we do notebooking for history. It’s almost not worth an entire blog post on it’s own because my approach is really simple and a little bit hands off. I’ve been using the notebooking method for history, science and religion for many years now and it has made the learning a great deal more interesting and enjoyable for the kids but it’s more of a part-of rather than the entirety of how we do any one subject
This year we are studying the Middle Ages. I cycle history beginning with Creation up to and including the Industrial Revolution throughout the elementary years. This way everyone usually hears it all twice and then high school is for more in depth studies and covering modern history. Modern history is also covered most days at the dinner table, in the car and whenever I can get a discussion going.
For resources I use a variety of spines depending on what we are studying and what my workload is for that particular time. My workload now is very heavy so we are relying on lots of read-a-louds, copywork and some independent study by the older children.
Our primary spine is Seton’s Our Catholic Legacy Vol. 1 and supplemental reading and copywork from Founders of Freedom Vol. l, The World’s Story, and The Light of Nations.
The lesson plans from RC History provide wonderful booklists, coloring pages, different pages with which to do saint reports, culture charts, and other nifty things. This all goes in the notebooks, in addition to maps, timeline notes,
and pages from Notebookpages.com. I have invested in the lifetime membership there and use the pages for a variety of subjects. There are still many free resources available and you can buy things individually as well.
So that’s about it, it’s not complicated. As we study we include things we like and enjoy in the notebooks. The coloring usually happens while I read aloud (currently Big John’s Secret) and the copywork assigned weekly.
I’d love to hear anyone else’s notebooking ideas.
MaryEllen, we too have used this simple but enjoyable approach, although my youngest isn’t much for coloring (never has been) so I’m at a bit of a roadblock as how to engage him and get him to add anything to his notebook, it’s painfully sparse this year, so yeah, mom failure with this one I guess LOL! Any suggestions??? <3
I have made up puzzle sheets for my boys who hate coloring and drawing. You can google making crossword puzzles or word searches (EDhelper.com is a good source) and they can add that kind of thing to their notebooks. Sometimes I will just ask them to make a boarder for their copywork to get some color in there or even to illustrate a battle plan (think a football playbook) if it’s appropriate to the subject. And of course there is always, “because I said so” :).
Oh I like the puzzle sheet idea – will look those up 🙂 Thanks!! And yes, I have used the “I said so” numerous times LOL!! xo