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For vocab, Carrie writes that we can store words on index cards in an abc file or we can use a composition book with pages for each letter.

My son wants to use the composition book. He loves composition books.

So, which one are you planning on using and why?

I think we're going to use the composition book...I just like the idea of a letter on the page and then a list of words. I'm not too keen on having index card boxes everywhere, and I wonder if the cards would make into them. What does everyone else think?

We use an index card BINDER. It's small and not bulky.
I have my kids draw a picture "clue" on the front of the card and then write the word and definition on the back. Then we flip through and review. Our kids take turns with their binders and enjoy quizzing each other. The most fun is the drawing/coloring of the picture cues on the cards. Our kids
love anything artsy crafty though. That's why I made that a part of our index/vocab/spelling system. We also do Bible verses in these binders. You can easily take the binders with you in the car and out of the house for something to do while you are in the Dr. office or waiting someplace.

Just thought I'd share. To each his own!

Carly

Carly,

I've never heard of that. Where can we find one? That sounds like a neat option.

Sometimes you can find the index binders at Wal-mart along with refillable index card packs. When Walmart is out, I go to an office supply store like Staples or Officemax and can find them there. You can reuse these year to year and they don't take much room to store.

Carly

Carly, actually I think that is a great idea! My kids love anything crafty too, which is why we have started doing a craft to go along with the phonics lessons.

Do you purchase the index card binders at a place such as Staples? or Walmart? I don't think I've ever seen them...but then I've never looked for them either so that isn't saying much!

This sounds like a good solution..something small would be great so we can take it with us to appts. Thanks!

We use the index card binders with already hole-punched cards as well. It's great! I also have alphabet tabs, so we can file the words alphabetically to practice that skill too. I also have found them at both WalMart and Office Depot.

We aren't in Preparing yet, but we use index cards with a keychain type ring in the corner.
I love to hear all the different ways we make things work for our families! Isn't awesome that this curriculum can be so flexible???

Hi Ladies,
We finished Bigger this past year and for Vocab, I let my 4th grade dd use the back of her history notebook to store her history vocab. We made a simple form on the computer with space at the top for picture and several lines across the middle and down for the word, part of speech, sentence, and definition. She prints out about 10 forms at a time and we store them in one of those small plastic 3 drawer file boxes with the rest of her supplies. I found on the clearance rack at Office Depot Alphabet tabbed dividers for $1.00 (A - Z), and we stuck these in the back of her history notebook, so she just whole punches each vocab page as she finishes it and puts it under the correct letter tab and alphabetized within each letter (dog, done, doze, etc.). I plan to continue this with her this year for Preparing. It worked out great!

For our Bible memory last year in Bigger, we used the Index card binders that the others mentioned above with the 2 hole-punched index cards. I just purchased her a replacement pack of cards for her Preparing Bible verses for the fall. It's nice to have all the Bible verses together in the binder. We'll store all her Bigger Bible verses in an Index card file at the end of each year and after several years, she'll have a whole file of Bible verses on index cards that she's memorized. I've decided to do this with my son this year as he begins Beyond.

Well, these are some of our efforts here. I love to read about what others are doing too to get more great ideas!
Take care,
Charlene

For Bigger we are doing an index card mini binder that is the size of the index cards. That has worked well. Bible verses and vocabulary can go there. I think I got them at office max. We separate things our with the adhesive tab system. Works well. We will continue it when we do Preparing. We do math and LA by composition book so it is nice to have something different.

We put our voc. words on the mini-index cards with rings in them already, I got them at Walmart. I also typed all of the Bible memory verses and glued them on index cards and put them in a ring as well. I had them laminated first. It is fun to hear everyone's organization systems!
Sheila