Do your children write on notebook paper the correct way?

[JudoMom]

A thread on the Logic subforum made me wonder how many homeschool kids have difficulty with this. If I hand my 4 older boys a piece of notebook paper, 1 will always get it correct and the other 3 are hit or miss. And I've explained the correct way to them several times.

 

So--do your kids consistently use notebook paper with the holes on the left and the margin at the top?

 

I added the poll--it's multiple choice :).

Edited March 23, 2011 by JudoMom

[K&Rs Mom]

Mine do, but I guess they usually get it still in the notebook so it's pretty obvious. I'm not sure we've had the situation of loose paper with holes, and until now it hadn't occurred to me to check!

[Amy in NH]

Mine usually do because they are the ones responsible for putting the papers away in their binders.

[Chris in VA]

Funny thing--Ds always used notebook paper correctly, but didn't know about spiral notebooks. He'd just open them at some random part and start writing. His notes were all over the place! (This was about 4th grade or so...) Just another example of how he needed explicit instruction in things--didn't gain much by inference as an Aspie.

[newlifemom]

I do not necessarily think this is a home school thing. I tutored a sibling group, who had previously been to private and public school. It was all I could do to get these super-achieving girls [all are doing college level work although the oldest is only 14] to set up the paper correctly.

 

My own do most of the time, but I have to correct my almost 9 yr ds about once a week.

[felicity]

My oldest doesn't. Even if it's already in the notebook more often than not he'll turn to the back side and start writing. He also writes all the way to end instead of stopping at the red.

 

It really didn't occur to me when we started homeschooling that one of my subjects would be "The Proper Way to Write on a Piece of Lined Paper." Latin, yes. Paper, no.

[lovemyboys]

A thread on the Logic subforum made me wonder how many homeschool kids have difficulty with this. If I hand my 4 older boys a piece of notebook paper, 1 will always get it correct and the other 3 are hit or miss. And I've explained the correct way to them several times.

 

So--do your kids consistently use notebook paper with the holes on the left and the margin at the top?

 

I added the poll--it's multiple choice :).

 

Lefty ds uses his notebook the opposite direction because of the binding....but you're talking about loose leaf, right?

[HappyCrazyMama]

They usually get the paper position correct. I ask them to put a heading their paper and they go :001_huh:.

[Karen in CO]

You forgot Other....:lol:

I don't give my kids notebook paper; they get printer paper or a notebook with the paper in it. Maybe I should buy some looseleaf paper and test them.

[coffeegal]

I almost answered, "If they're lucky!" I pitched a flamboyant fit everytime they used the paper incorrectly, followed by a 5 minute demonstration of "This is the front, this is the back, this is the front, this is the back..." Now the children almost always get it correct. :lol:

[SailorMom]

Glad to see I'm not alone!

[FrogMom5]

I checked "more often than not" because we've worked on it so much! :lol:

 

Seriously, didn't this come automatically to all of us when we were in school? I don't remember the teachers reminding us to turn our papers correctly.

 

Until now I thought we were the only ones. My oldest ds has dyslexia and ADD. I thought it was just one of his organizing problems. :D

 

Denise

[JudoMom]

You forgot Other....:lol:

I don't give my kids notebook paper; they get printer paper or a notebook with the paper in it. Maybe I should buy some looseleaf paper and test them.

 

Yes--test them! Surely you have two sheets of looseleaf somewhere....

[elegantlion]

It's a 50/50 chance, right? Oh, wait there is always the turn it upside down and backwards. :svengo:

 

He's writing something, isn't that enough! :tongue_smilie: Now I have to worry about where he writes it.

 

Yup, we're working on it too.

[missmoe]

You needed a "they do now"!

 

It never occurred to me to teach which side of the paper is the right side, until my dd came home from a class she takes at the high school with a lower grade becuase she had started her paper on the back instead of the front. :tongue_smilie:

[Desert Strawberry]

My 8yo (with SPD-similar to the Aspie and dyslexics aforementioned) usually get his notebook correct. I don't think we've used unbound paper. I had to show him once or twice.

 

He did random, messy, incomplete entries in his journal, and that I did throw a huge fit about. I had given him explicit instructions, and repeatedly reinforced them, but he blew me off and did it wrong, saying, yes, I put my name, yes, I'm using the first clean sheet, yes, I wrote complete sentences, Yes, I put the date at the top, when none of it was true. That was not a good day.

 

I do remember being taught how to orient the paper when we switched from wide ruled "school" paper to regular notebook paper. Actually, I remember being taught at each stage, how to orient each type of paper. My teachers were pretty exacting about those kinds of things. I also remember them taping papers to desks, and slanting our papers differently to accomodate our individual handwriting styles.

[Pam L in Mid Tenn]

I voted everytime, but my youngest is in 7th grade and we've been working on this for 7 years.

 

I sub teach. Even ps students in upper elementary grades do not always write on paper the correct way.

 

They will eventually understand. Just keep showing them.

[Parrothead]

Oh, goodness, I'm the only "never!"

[talexand]

This is a pet peeve of mine with my second child (4th grade). He goes to school half time so it is not necessarily a homeschool thing. If he has the right orientation at all, he starts on the top line instead of the second. He does not respect the red line and has no sense of order on the paper at all. I have explained it numerous times. He just doesn't care. I don't mean this in a bad way. It just isn't a priority to him or something that he thinks about. I guess I could make him redo the work and he would start caring. But he hates writing things down already. I don't really want the fit that he would throw.

[danybug]

I laughed when I first saw talk about this. I was sure that my ds was the only one that had to be taught this at 10. He had no clue where a heading went, to stop at the red line, and to put the holes on the left.

 

The other day I asked him to get the college rule paper and he was like rules for what college :lol:

[JudoMom]

Oh, goodness, I'm the only "never!"

 

I've got one who is almost a never :lol:.

[Mothersweets]

I almost answered, "If they're lucky!" I pitched a flamboyant fit everytime they used the paper incorrectly, followed by a 5 minute demonstration of "This is the front, this is the back, this is the front, this is the back..." Now the children almost always get it correct. :lol:

 

 

I did answer "If they're lucky!" . I think I'll have to try your technique. Maybe if I go on and on and on about it, they'll do it properly just to shut me up. :tongue_smilie:

[Crissy]

They do now, but it was really a struggle for Jeffrey to figure it out all those years ago.

[Melissa in Australia]

I don't use notebook paper,

But my Ds13 can't get it right with his exercise book. Half the time it is upside down, sometimes he writes at the back of the book, or right in the middle. It is not just laziness, he has terrible Dyslexia, and his whole life seems to be in a constant state of confusion. He was complaining that his watch was going backwards for a while. Took a long time (days) to work out it was on backwards.

[3lilreds in NC]

I *think* it's more often than not. My older dd gets it all the time; the younger one sometimes uses the back and I have no idea why. The correct way seems perfectly obvious to me. They do put a lot of stuff in binders so I just don't get it. Score one for public school. :lol: (Kidding, kidding, kidding. Please don't yell.)

[JudoMom]

I *think* it's more often than not. My older dd gets it all the time; the younger one sometimes uses the back and I have no idea why. The correct way seems perfectly obvious to me. They do put a lot of stuff in binders so I just don't get it. Score one for public school. :lol: (Kidding, kidding, kidding. Please don't yell.)

 

:lol:

 

Yeah, I just don't get it. I don't remember every struggling with this, and every time I think my animated demonstrations have gotten through, I go to check work and someone has written on their paper backwards, or upside down, or both.

[In the Rain]

Until last week, I would have said always. 6yo dd has a notebook she has started using upside down due to a bend in one of the corners. :lol:

[~Tara~]

My older two, yes, and have for 'forever'.

My 9 yr old, :lol: yeah right, if I'm lucky. He's also the 'notes anywhere within a notebook' kid, up until recently. Well, he has a notebook he uses for church and that is consistently used from beginning to end, but other than that, who knows!

The 7 and 5 yr old...not much hope of them getting it correct, in spite of my continual reminders.

[Sasharowan]

The 3 older ones do, but I spent a year adding that to their check off list. 2pts. for holes to the left and margin on top. another 2 pts. for name and date in top right corner.

[ocelotmom]

I actually just this morning taught DS what the red line on the left side of the page is for. He was writing right up against the perforation. Not over, thankfully, or he'd have had to start over and that would have been a drama.

 

He's writing his letters across two lines of a college ruled page (with the line in-between as a middle line). That's fine for now - he's certainly not old enough for college ruled paper to be particularly appropriate otherwise.

[joannqn]

My daughter knows how to use paper. My son tends to write on the back side of the paper.

 

On a similar note, my son tried to turn in a writing assignment today with a 2 inch right margin, 1/4 inch bottom margin (if that):glare:, and with a funky, hard-to-read font.

[mom2bee]

This was really hit or miss with me when I was growing up. All my work, except for math, went in a binder at the end of the day. Around 3rd/4th grade, my mom started complaining. By the end of 5th she had instituted the following policy:

 

If it is wrong, do it all the way over. No exceptions.

[dsmith]

Just today, I asked ds to write down 3 facts he learned in his history reading. He wrote the first fact about 2 inches to the right of the margin, the next one he wrote 3 inches to the right, and the last one was right at the margin.:confused: No spaces between the lines either. If I don't remind him, he writes all over the place. Sometimes I will put arrows where I want him to write.

[busymama7]

This makes me happy to know we aren't the only ones to struggle with this. Its mainly one of them and we work on it often.