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I've tried to keep up with the updates on the new guide, but I don't recall any notebooking pages being mentioned. Sorry if they have been and I missed it! I am very excited about our CTC notebooking pages and was wondering if there were plans for them in RTR?

If not can I say "Please, pretty please can we have notebook pages."

I sure hope so. My daughter loves the notebooking pages. Three great reasons to have them...

1. Better penmanship. My daughter works extra hard to keep those pages looking beautiful.

2. It provides accountability. No way we can skip anything that is part of the notebooking page. She would die if she had a blank spot.

3. The pages are so beautiful, daughter pulls out her notebook all the time and shows it to everyone. She is getting constant review as she re-looks at all her pages.

Pretty please!!

I am so glad that you ladies are enjoying the notebooking pages. We are loving them at our house too! At this point, we are planning to continue having full-color notebooking pages to correspond with our upper level guides from CTC upward. So, RTR will have full-color pages as well.

With RTR, we are considering a different approach with the notebooking pages, having sections within the notebook instead. This is because we have some assignments that aren't weekly due to the resources we are planning to use within RTR. So, the notebooking is seeming to fall better into sections.

Some and possibly all of the sections we are contemplating at this point include the following:
1. A section for the timeline where students will make their timeline entries weekly

2. A "Who's Who"? section for twice weekly entries on the famous people we are reading about within RTR (full-color pictures of the people would be provided)

3. A "Worth Quoting" section for copying one or more famous quotes each week from those individuals about whom the kiddos are reading

4. A Draw and Write section (for the student's drawings)

5. A "Places in Time" section (for the research the students will be doing on famous places once weekly). This would be done in a picture postcard fashion with a full-color picture of the place being researched (provided as the front of the postcard) and space being left next to it for writing about the place.

6. An "Art Gallery" section with a page devoted to each of the 8 or more famous artists covered in the year's readings. Each artist would likely have his own page with his famous paintings shown in small sizes on the page in full-color, with spaces for labeling the artwork below. This would give the students a great feel for the artist's style and work.

7. An "Hour Book" section (which will be a project in which the students will create an actual shortened "Hour Book" while reading "Gabriel and the Hour Book")

8. And a "Tales from Shakespeare" section (which is an optional additional section) that will include black and white pictures by two different famous artists from 18 stories in the 1907 versions of Tales of Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb. We own copies of these 1900's versions with illustrations by Harold Copping and another set by Robert Anning Bell and will be able to use the beautiful artwork, as it's in public domain. For those choosing the Shakespeare Option of the Economy Package, the students will color some of the provided drawings as they read a Shakespeare story or part of a story weekly and will also copy a quote for each story.

8. Students will also be completing maps, which could be inserted into the notebook as its own section as well.

As always, this is a work in progress and is subject to change. But, we are very excited about this notebook and are praying we will find the best mix. The price is also a factor as to how much we can include in full-color. So, we would love to hear thoughts from you ladies on this topic. To include all of these sections, we would be looking at a retail price for the notebook of $26.95 with an additional $7.99 notebook for the Shakespeare option. We could omit or down-size some sections to bring the price of the notebook down.

Blessings,
Carrie

Oh My Goodness!!! It sounds wonderful!!!

I can't wait!!!



Edited because I got so excited about all the wonderful aspects I forgot to respond about the cost. The kids and I are all about color!!! We really love the CTC notebooking pages and they would not be the same without the beautiful rich colors, so I would have not problem paying the price for what sounds to be a truly wonderful RTR notebook! It sounds like a great price to me for everything you have mentioned!

That sounds wonderful! I am really looking forward to it, but have a long wait (we are only on LHFHG). I think that price is reasonable and would pay it..

I love it! I would be happy to pay the price for the notebooking pages. I am loving my dd's CTC notebooking pages and will keep her notebook as a keepsake.
I am already getting excited about next year, but I must admit that I wonder how it could get any better than CTC. We are having a wonderful year using HOD for the first time.

Patti

WOW! That sounds great!

I think the price would be okay. The full color notebook for CTC is going to be a wonderful keepsake. I'm sure the same will be true of RTR.

Wow! I think it sounds fabulous! What a wonderful way to pull it all together for the student and what a great way for them to look back at year-end on the accomplishment of their hard work. I think the price sounds just fine! Currently, I pay $4 per notebook that has 1/2 lines and 1/2 blank x2 per child AND that's just plain paper. (Bummer that I stocked up on these because I will buy the RTR notebook pages!)

These sound like wonderful notebooking pages, Carrie! I have been looking forward to using Lamb's Tales from Shakespeare and would be pleased to pay for the main pages and the optional one. We love the CTC pages and they will be something to keep for posterity!

Rachael

This sounds SO wonderful that I'm not sure I can wait 2 1/2 years Just kidding, because there's going to be alot of "wonderful" between here and there.
As for the cost, we would be happy to pay that price for what you are describing. Less than $1 per week of school per kid...much less than taking them out for hot cocoa few times.
I recently had to make copies for our co-op when we were out of printer ink at home, and it came to a whopping $6.95 for 60 black and white copies! Now that shocked me

Ladies,

I am SO excited that you are excited! We love the idea of these pages too. After pondering more on the notebooking pages the last few days, I did realize that it's very nice to have each unit in the notebooking have its entries together. This does make for less flipping around for my sons and as Daisy mentioned, it is easy to check to see whether there is a blank spot. My sons make sure to fill each page and skip nothing!

So, we are pondering a way to possibly combine all of the things we mentioned above into a unit by unit fashion. In this way, each unit would have 2-4 notebooking pages, but all needed boxes and items would be right on those pages. The Shakespeare option would still need to be separate though.

I love having the insight of each of you ladies, as it helps me formalize in my own mind what works best for my kiddos too. I do love the idea of less page flipping, and I would also love to have the kiddo's written narrations in the notebook again next year. So, we'll see if the unit by unit idea can work out, or whether we need to stay with the section by section idea instead. Since most of you seem to think the price would be alright that also makes a difference as to whether we could do a unit by unit approach (which takes up more pages).

Thanks for brainstorming with me. If you have any thoughts on this topic, I'd love to hear them.

Blessings,
Carrie

Hi Carrie,

I wonder if there is a need for a similar set of pages for the science section in RTR? Her science pages from Bigger are in a notebook this year and she is really getting alot out of having it all in the same place (for review and for satisfaction in a completed job). Is there a need to have a preprepared notebook pages with a place to notebook the science questions as well? I love this idea for History......I am looking forward to the year we get to dig into this.

Thanks for keping us updated about the future programs.....it is very exciting to see it all come together!

Treewin,

This is a good suggestion, and one we've pondered quite a bit as well. The drawbacks we keep running into for doing science notebooking pages is that we have limited time for our graphic designer to get these together each year, as the notebooking pages are incredibly time-consuming to make, and we run into an increased cost factor for the customer every time we offer notebooking pages.

So, this may be an option we explore at a later date, as the pages could be added as an option to a guide that is already written. For now, we're focusing on the history pages, as they'll be a required part of the curriculum.

I appreciate you sharing your thoughts. It looks as if our thinking runs along a similar path!

Blessings,
Carrie

I LOVE IT! I love the who's who with pictures, I love the artist study, I love the shakespeare study. It is all so awesome. My daughter is going to LOVE it. Doing CTC this year has been amazing, she has loved it and next year looks even BETTER. The notebooking is her favorite part. You are an answer to prayer.