Messy Books, Neat Books and Nature Journals

Messy Books, Neat Books and Nature journals are all other forms of Lapbooking - these are not necessary but you may want to use them. It is good practise to date each page of any lapbook and make a note of the Core Program and lesson. 

More details on other forms of Lapbooks are below:

• A Messy Book: This is for recording things you need to write down (or your child needs to write down) that you don't want to do in your Lapbook and have no requirement for particular neatness. This reduces handwriting anxiety. Use your Messy Book instead of scrap paper for things such as shopping lists, spelling tests, word banks, handwriting, explaining maths concepts etc. Your messy book is also a learning record. You can just use a notebook or a cheap exercise book for a Messy Book.
• A Neat Book: There may come a time where your child wants or needs a 'Neat Book'. We suggest a spiral-bound notebook so that you can easily remove pages to include into your Lapbook or remove to send as samples. A Neat Book is part way between a Messy Book and a Lapbook. You might choose to do this if you are practising handwriting, or if you need lined pages to handwrite work that will go into your Lapbook.
• Nature Journaling is also a form of Lapbooking. We recommend a hardcover A5 Visual Arts Diary (with unlined Pages) for a Nature Journal. Add your Nature Journals and some writing supplies to your backpack in snaplock bags to protect them when you go out and always date the page and add the location. While you are out, ask your child/ren to draw in detail one small thing you see. If you are creating a family nature journal and/or have younger children, you might prefer to supply each child with their own small clipboard with blank paper. When you get home, collect the pages, cut and paste to display your family’s work.
• Some Core Programs also have small self-contained Lapbooks for a particular purpose such as the wall calendar in A Year of our Farm or the counting book in The Waterhole.