Our Island Story Lapbook: Part Four

     We are now onto the reign of John and Henry III.  Notice there are no numbers after John.  I think he must have effectively killed that name for future English monarchs. 
     Since the Magna Carta played such a major role in both of these king's lives, two of the three mini books were about that.  I had Anna write her own Magna Carta, and it's pretty funny and sweet.  She sealed it with beeswax pressed with a coin. 

This is the inside of the magna carta mini book.  I am waiting until we read Robinhood, to have her fill out the Robinhood mini book.    

Our Island Story Lapbook, part 3

     Here is the Henry II and Richard I page of our lapbook.  It has a map of the holy land, a crusades mini book, picture of a crusaders cross, and Planta genista, from which the Plantagenets derived their name.  There is also a picture showing all of Henry II's eight children.   Richard I never married or had children.

     Here is the mini book opened out.

Our Island Story Lapbook- Part Two

      Here is the second page of the Our Island Story lapbook.  It has information on Henry I and Stephen, as well as stuff pertaining to that time period. 

     We had to do a little digging to find the names of Stephen's wife and children, as they were not mentioned in the book, but it is doing stuff like that, that makes it more interesting.  One question I have in the King's "fact sheet" is "Good or bad king?"  I have asked Anna to put down what she thinks, using her own judgement.  When it came to answering that question about Stephen, she said she thought he wasn't a bad man, but he ruled very badly, so that made him a bad king.  I thought that was very well put.

     Here are the mini books unfolded.  The code of chivalry mini book I got from Homeschoolshare, a great lapbooking resource. 

Our Island Story Lapbook -part 1

     Seeing how well Anna retained the information she learned while working on a lapbook, I decided to start integrating them into more subjects.  Our core book for history is Our Island Story, and although I loved reading about ancient England and the Dark Ages last year, Anna was just not that into it.  I blamed it on the fact that our addition of the book has no pictures, and since what we were reading was all new to Anna, it didn't make much sense.  Reading about Julius Caesar conquering England with a fleet of galley ships is really interesting, unless you don't know anything about Julius Caesar, or Rome, and have no idea what a galley is.  Then it's a rather pointless story.  I tried to get pictures off the internet, but it just wasn't enough.  That is where lapbooks come in.  A lapbook can provide pictures, which she desperately needs to visualize the story, a reason to study the characters more in depth, and the opportunity to give simple written narrations. What I came up with isn't exactly a lapbook, since it goes in a three ring binder, but it is essentially the same thing.  I intend to one day post all my resources online so that others can take advantage of it, but for now, I thought I would show it as we go along.  This is the first page, with info on the first two Williams.

       So, has working on a lapbook for history helped?  I would say immensely.  Her narrations have gotten so much better, and she seems to really be forming a relationship with the people that we are reading about. She listens more attentively so that she will have stuff to write about. Most of all, she loves history now, where as before she didn't. 

Butterfly Lapbook

     This is Anna's second nature themed lapbook.  Progress on this went a bit slower than with the tree lapbook, but she still enjoyed working on it.  One of the fun things we did to learn more about butterflies is to look at butterfly and moth wings under our microscope. 

It's just a small student microscope, but we were able to see the individual scales on the wings.  I thought it was interesting, because I had always heard that the ends of moth wing scales are jagged, which is what gives moths their fuzzy appearance, and butterflies have smooth scalloped scales. Well... that isn't so.

The picture on the left is of a moth wing, and even though the scales end in a point, they are smooth. (The dots are where the scales have been rubbed off) The butterfly wing however, (which I do not have a picture of) did have a jagged edge on the ends of the scales. Hmmm...

 Finding butterfly wings to examine was rather serendipitous.  I was walking in my yard when I looked down, and there was a beautiful Spicebush Swallowtail, minus the body.  Apparently a bird had gotten it.  After snipping off a small piece to look at under the microscope, Anna thought it would be neat to have the wings in her lapbook, so I taped them onto some card stock and made a little envelope to hold them. 

 

Her spelling and handwriting aren't perfect, but I love her enthusiasm. 

Tree Lapbook

     Anna is going to be doing lapbooks this summer for her more in depth nature studies.  She will still be keeping a nature journal, but lapbooks are just so much fun.  I can imagine for some children they would be torturous, but Anna is very crafty and creative, so lapbooks are a great fit for her.  In fact, she has retained the information she learned through making her first lapbook so well, that I have decided to incorporate them into many of our school subjects next year. 
     Here are a few pictures of her tree lapbook.

The cover

Inside

      She has now turned into a little tree conservationist.  We were driving by a place in town where they are grading the land to build a couple of new stores, and Anna was horrified to see the woods that had been there completely gone.   She said, "I know they have to have space, but did they have to cut down all the trees?"  Good question.

Making Paper the Quick and Easy Way

     I discovered this way of making paper a little while back when I was teaching my co-op nature class.  I wanted the kids to make paper as an activity to go along with our wasp study, but I couldn't find any tutorials that didn't require hours of time and lot's of equipment.  That was until I discovered the tin can method.  You can turn out little circles of paper in just a few minutes, and I didn't have to buy or make any special equipment.  We had so much fun making this in class, that I decided to incorporate it into Anna's tree lapbook. 
     







All you need is :
1. Two tin cans, (or a tin can and a yogurt container, as is the case here) with one of the cans having it's bottom cut out.
2. A blender.
3. Window screen.
4. An embroidery hoop.
5. Several rags or hand towels
6. Scrap paper

It was actually all those little bits of paper left over from cutting out the mini books, that gave me the idea of making paper for her lapbook.
     After you have all your supplies, start ripping up the paper into little bits, and then let them soak for a few minutes.  Dump the water and the paper into the blender, and blend until it looks like sludge.  Set your embroidery hoop with the screen in it, on top of the yogurt container, and then put your bottomless can on top of that.  Lift up the can when the water has mostly drained out, and it looks gelatinous.

Press the water out with a rag, and then remove the screen.  If the paper wants to stick to the screen, just press some more water out. 

 Lay the paper on another rag or paper towel, and press some more.  That's it!  This project is so easy, that Anna was able to do it almost entirely by herself.  She made  a few different colors, and even experimented by putting leaves in the mix. 

Here are some of the paper circles finished, and drying in the sun.

Notebooking

     I recently decided to incorporate notebooking into our schooling.  Anna is very into anything crafty, so this seemed like a good fit for her.  When I first suggested it to her she seemed uninterested in the idea, but I started going through ideas about what she could do with it, and the next thing I know she is asking if she can start on 

one right away!  She wanted to make her own "book" so we chose to use a paper binder, instead of a three ring one.  I thought it would be fun to do a notebook on The Adventures of Peter Cottontail as this is the book she is reading to get her "Book It" pizza this month.  Making the notebook helped perk up her interest in reading the book, and become more attached to the book it's self.  It has also been a great way for her to practice her growing cursive skills.  I think the next book I would like for her to do a notebook on is Our Island Story.  She has been having a hard time getting into it, and a note book might help it come to life.
     Here's a look at some of her pages.

Reddy Fox is laying in wait for Peter in a hollow log.  You have to lift the flap to see him.

Here's another lift the flap page. Reddy Fox is taking a stroll with Sammy Jay...

...and when you lift the flap you see Blacky Crow.

I suggested to Anna that she write an excerpt from the book, but she didn't like that idea and so she wrote this. For Anna, originality is very important.
     The next one is a collage, depicting Peter talking to Grandfather Frog.
     Notebooking has turned out to be more educational than I first thought that it would be, and Anna really seems to enjoy it.  I would love to see other peoples finished notebooks for more ideas on how to put it together.