Apologia Notebooking Journals, opinions please.

[BlessedMom]

Please share your thoughts about the "Notebooking Journals" you can buy to go with the Apologia Science books.

 

 

Can you please describe what they are exactly for me?

 

Pros/cons.

Likes/dislikes.

 

I would appreciate any information you think might be beneficial.

 

 

Thanks for your time.

[JadeOrchidSong]

I am just searching about the notebooking journals and I am not very impressed with what I saw. I HATE any form of crossword puzzles. And the What Do You Remember part is just a reproduction of the questions in the main textbook with some space for kids to write in. You can easily do it with your own generic notebook. I am not sold on this one yet.

Do you know that there are free notebooking pages you can print out from their website? You can try that too.

I am considering this science series for my boys 7 and 5 and I am lost where to start. I would like to start with Astronomy, the easiest one (it is said), but my older is learning Human body in the fall in the co-op and I would like to use that to line up.

J

[Cleopatra]

Have you seen the free ones you can get on-line? http://www.jeanniefulbright.com/NotebookPages.html

 

I had a chance to view them all at the latest convention near me. They included many of the pages in the link I just gave you, and they had some extras as well. I looked them all over and the only one I thought I would pay money for was the one for their newest book, Human Anatomy and Physiology. It had some very interesting mini-books, lapbook ideas, etc. Of course, you can't get this one free yet, so perhaps that's why it looked so good! :001_smile:

 

We've used the free notebooking pages so far and find that they are adequate. We try printing colour pictures off the internet of what we're studying to spice them up a little!

[simka2]

Just a note on the crosswords puzzles: They have been great for my kids to reinforce the vocabulary words!!!! These are some pretty big words for my young group, so I have actually become a fan.

 

I also didn't see the experiment sheets or the mini books in the old notebook. Again, not that you have to have them, but they do make life easier.

 

(If your going to lap book the mini books are a great resource!!!!!)

Edited May 14, 2010 by simka2

[Delighted3]

We love the astronomy one. There is a schedule in the front of the book for doing each chapter and the notebooking . Lesson 2 looks like this. pg. 19-20 Fascinating facts about the sun notebook page, pg. 21- sun page where my kids drew a diagram of the sun with solar flares, sun spots, etc., Pg. 22-a page to write short speech about why you should not look at the sun, pg. 23-what do you remember questions, pg. 24-place for sun collage, pg. 25-copywork, pg. 26-27- vocabulary crossword, pg. 28-My sun projects- a place to write or draw what they did and what they learned or you could put any pictures taken of their projects, pg. 29- The Sun, a mostly blank page to put the minut books that are in the back of the book about different aspects of the sun, pg. 30 Take it further-more projects other than the ones listed in the book and sometimes supplemental reading books. When it is all done, it will be a very nice keepsake for the kids to look back on. There a lot of blank notebook pages that are similiar to the free resource mentioned, but there are a lot of pages included that are not a part of the free one and the minut books are very nicely done in color.

HTH,

Joy

[wy_kid_wrangler04]

I love them! I get them for all the books, for all the kids(well I will when they get to them) They have a review in each section. The crossword puzzles are of the vocabulary words, which is great reinforcement! (for my kids anyways) They have different types of paste pages, with different questions that the kids have to think about the answers (they are thought questions so its not simply fill in the blank) they have scripture copy work for both printing and cursive for each lesson, and they have futher study options which my kids LOVE! They love digging deeper into the subjects! We love it! Will will continue getting them! I just ordered two today for the anatomy and physiology (ordered the book today as well!) they are cheaper on Christian book's website! Thats where we ordered ours from today!

[NavyWifeandMommy]

I bought my journals for my 4th/5th grader. She will be doing this science semi independently so it was worth the price. I bought them on sale thru CBD.com. I like how I don't have to print out pages and get a binder and page protectors. I tend to be on the pile up and organize later type person (this will never change for me) so having the journal with it all there is worth it.

[TracyR]

We have the Astronomy one and I think its worth the money. We used the free notebooking pages on Jeanie Fulbright's website and they worked just fine, but I think the Notebook is better.

The notebook is especially good to have if you have to do evaluations at the end of the year. Its all there in one book nice and neat.

You don't have to print out the sheets and you won't have a big binder either laying around. Its all there in a nice book

It includes notebooking pages, crossword pages , questions from the book ( great for older kids grades 3 and up) , there are minibooks at the end of it should you want to create a lapbook too. It also includes extra activities to do in addition to the textbook, and other experimentsl. In addition there are also copywork pages in the journal for your child to practice their handwriting as well.

You don't have to do all of the stuff that is included in it. Jeanie Fulbright stated that you can pick and choose what you want.

I'll admit I think the notebook pages in the journal are much nicer then the ones on the website.

Of course if money is an issue the free ones work just as well, but if you have the money to spend I think the journals are worth the money.

 

The only course that does not have free notebook pages at the moment is the new Human Anatomy & Physiology book. That one you would have to buy the journal for.

[hsbeth]

We used the astronomy journal this year and enjoyed it. Geared for a 2-5th grader I guess. Apologia's website has pretty extensive samples as I recall, almost a full chapter's worth of the pages to print.

[NancyNellen]

I am using the astronomy notebooks with a 4th grader and 1st grader. They love them. I love them. They are simple and you certainly could put one together yourself. But, in my busy little corner of the world, they are worth the money. Both of these kids told me yesterday that science is their favorite subject - my 4th grader added that it is because of the notebooks.

 

I got them on sale at cbd a while back.

 

They include "cover pages" for drawings and titles of each new lesson. There are pages for narrations, and occasional puzzles, etc. There are frames for pictures. I especially like the schedule in the front of the book. It makes planning super-fast and easy.

 

BTW, my kiddos love to do crossword puzzles - and they seem to help reinforce the vocabulary quite well, at least with my kids.

[HSing...AndLovin'It]

We used the free notebooking pages and they worked very well. My son was in 4th grade when we used them and although he does well in writing I would not have wanted to make him do any more writing than the free pages required as he was doing enough in other subjects. For 5th gr we used a lot of the pages from a yahoo group, love2learn (sorry, I could not find the link.) There were newpaper templates and pages with color pictures and report pages for each animal. I had to pick and choose because there were too many!