Book Binding

I am a huge fan of eBooks! I'm also a huge fan of binding my own books and planners. There are tons of different ways you can bind your own books. When I first started, I used a 3 hole punch, fasteners, and masking tape. Then I graduated to using gorilla glue and masking tape. Now I use a GBC ProClick P50 32-Hole Paper Punch, ProClick spines, and 3:1 pitch plastic coil spines from Best Buy Binding (the cheapest place I have found so far). The size of the book depends on which spine I bind it with. The ProClick spines only hold up to 110 sheets with their biggest size (5/8), so if I'm binding a big book, I use the coil. I got 22mm which holds over 200 sheets; this takes care of pretty much all of my needs.

The steps to using the paper punch and spines are pretty simple. Sometimes I laminate the covers with my laminator, and then punch those, just depends on what I'm working on though. No matter, the steps are still going to be the same. First, you hole punch all of the book. This can take awhile depending on book size. You can only punch around 6 pages with this hole puncher. After you're finished with that, you just pick the spine you want to use. The ProClick spines just "zip up" so to speak, then you're done. If you're using the plastic coil, you would just wind it into the holes until you have gone through each. Then, take your clippers and clip off the extra coil. For this, you want to make sure you don't take off too much. Here is a good video to watch so you can make sure you do it right. The do use coil crimpers. I did not see the need for them. I just clip the coil and then bend it with a pair of pliers. Then viola! Done! You can see the picture of my planner that I just bound today. Tootles!

Homeschool Day Book

I found the perfect little record keeping program! It's called "Homeschool Day Book", and it has to be one of the easiest record keeping programs I have found, trust me, I've tried a lot. It is very simple to set up. I used their automated set up and just typed in my children's names, then I typed in my own set of classes (there was an option to use what is pre-installed, but I use different ones), and that was pretty much it. It keeps track of attendance, hours/minutes spent on a subject, and what you do for each subject. You can also print out reports to place in your portfolio's or whenever the need arises! It also offers the option to change the theme of the program between flat system, flat blue, gloss blue, gloss sliver, gloss dark, and gloss dark (purple).

All in all, this is a very easy to use, light program. It doesn't offer a ton of options that could be easily intimidating to some. It's nice, simple, and to the point. I see this being most beneficial to people who don't want or need a lot of bells and whistles. It offers a great approach of unschoolers! I also think this would be an extremely beneficial program for unschoolers in Missouri, since we have to track our hours instead of days.

They are offering a free trial of the complete program too! This way you can download it, and give it a whirl before you commit to buy! How great is that! :)

SO Busy here lately!

I've been deep in the "re-organization" world here lately! I decided I didn't like some of the ways we were doing things, so I took some time off to re-thing and re-organize. My goodness how long that took to go through everything! LOL I did find some wonderful resources along the way though :) I would love to let everyone out there know about Dynamic2Moms . This site has some absolutely wonderful things on it. It has a complete curriculum planner, lapbooks, as well as links to other pages of interest. This has to be one of my favorite sites! Their curriculum planner is absolutely wonderful, but they also let me tweak part of it to fit my needs here in Missouri a bit better, then listed it on their page too :) They also let me share a couple other pages I created on there. They are a fabulous bunch of girls!

Another site that I found and fell in love with is St Aiden's Homeschool . She has a ton of great freebies on her site. And when I say a ton, I really mean it! I have also bought some of her unit studies that I absolutely adore. This is really a good site to visit if you have the time!

FREE Language Arts Curriculum

I've been searching the internet again and found some very nice resources. The first one is actually an oldie but goody. It's Scott Foresman Grammar and Writing Handbooks. You can download each workbook for free! In my opinion, they are one of the best there is. It combines grammar and writing into an all in one, easy to use format. This is what we are using and I absolutely love it. Also, if you're not a grammar wiz and feel you need the answer keys, you can go to Pearson's website and set up a homeschoolers account through OASIS. I did it, and it was very easy to accomplish. If you need more help, you can always call their customer support or email them with the links on their site.

The second LA curriculum is by English Banana. I have not used them, but have looked at the available material. What they provide is strictly grammar related. They have a very nice website with links to games, video, tools, and downloadable workbooks. The workbooks themselves are pretty straight forward and simple. The workbooks I've downloaded are "Big Grammar Book", "Big Activity Book", and "Big Resource Book".

The "Big Grammar Book" is pretty nice, but not really a "teaching workbook". It's more of a nice resource book to use to test the child's knowledge of what you have already taught. I do think I will use this as something to put in their portfolios. The "Big Activity Book" is a workbook of grammar worksheets that could come in handy. Then is the "Big Resource Book", which for me isn't really a resource book. It's more of another extra set of practice worksheets. This too could come in handy in a bind though.

All in all, I found both programs were good. However, I thought Scott Foresman was the better option since it combined the grammar and writing. Plus, I found it was a more complete curriculum all around.

Hope that sheds some light on these two curriculums. ;)

A GREAT Site for Kids!

I was searching the internet today trying to find the answer keys to Scott Foresman Grammar and Writing Handbooks. Guess what, they're not out there! So, I mozzied on over to Pearson to see if could find them there. I did indeed find them. I also happened upon a cool little site! It's called Poptropica. It's like this little world for the kids to go through and earn credits that they can use in the "store". Of course, if you don't want to do their games (which happen to be pretty fun, I tried one of them to check for myself), you can always just buy the credits yourself. As I said, the games are fun, but could get irritating for an impatient child. I even found myself getting a little irritated at it. This also has a chat for the kids, if they own the "multiverse" card (which can be purchased in the store), or if one of their friends invites them to the chat with a code.

I hope your kiddo's find this enjoyable!

Notebooking System....

I found this online and thought you may like it. It's call The Full Year Notebooking System. Click Here!

It's Been Awhile....

Wow...talk about hectic life. Sorry I haven't had any updates lately. We took a few weeks "off" for VBS, and then to spend the last week of summer vaca with the kids cousin. Next week is back to school! I wonder if anyone else out there is relieved that all the public school children are back in session. I know I am. No more severely crowded stores. So much easier running errands now.

Anyway, I'll be starting with my updates again next week. Enjoy the weekend!