As I mentioned last year, about this time we had a “special” baby. He’s over that now, but since he needed a lot of care back then, I needed homeschool automated. It was so successful that I’m doing it again this year. Above you see my sixth grade notebook all dressed and ready to go to the binder.
How To Do It
- Amass all the copies needed for ten weeks of work. (I have docs for this at the bottom.)
- Divide it into subjects.
- Insert sturdy dividers. (I like file folders.)
- Take to Office Depot and ask for spiral binding.
- Repeat every ten weeks.
The Other Resources
- Amass all of the flashcards, books, and keys for ten weeks of school.(On the docs at the bottom)
- Divide them into four groups:Immediate Daily kid, Immediate Daily mom, Not-so-often, Later
- Put the Immediate Daily kid in his backpack
- Put the Immediate Daily mom in your bag
- Put the rest on the shelf. (I have a clear tub on the shelf for “later” cards and test, etc.)
Why Only Ten Weeks?
You could really do it more or less often. But:
- My brain works in trimesters.
- I tinker a lot. Week 20 looks very different from week 3.
- We get off weeks in some subjects; each notebook starts where we left off.
How Do You Bridge?
Some worksheets have a front in one trimester and a back in the other. Also, sometimes we’re ahead in one subject and behind in others. That makes rebooting the notebook more complicated.
If it’s a bunch of workbook pages…
- Rebind. Just put them in again. This only works if you make sure you understand which way the first binder punched the papers. You can center it, bump it to the right, bump it to the left; all of that changes how the spiral goes through. If you don’t know which way it was punched, you may end up with extra holes on one end or that other that don’t match the freshly punched copies.
- Cut off the old holes and rebind.
- Copy the pages you need and bind them fresh.
If it’s something I personally printed…I reprint it.
How Much is Ten Weeks?
I made these into Word Documents so you can alter them. I will add the second trimester later in the year.
Weeks 1-10:
*Spelling notebook is separate in proclick notebook so we can add pages