Puzzles in Notebooks {50 Things Series}

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Blog Series 50 Things to Put Into a Notebook

This post is an expansion of  another popular blog post– 50 Things to Put in a Notebook . I take the items on that long list and give more information about each one. Today’s focus is puzzles.

Fifty Things to Put into a Notebook:  #5 Puzzles

Puzzles are a fun addition to a study and can be used as a review or wrap up activity. Generally puzzles use the vocabulary from a topic of study, so they are good for children who enjoy word play. Besides crossword puzzles, word searches, and scrambled words, there are acrostics and anagrams.

Printed Puzzles for Homeschool Notebooks

Two reproducible puzzle books that we have used in the past are the Big Book of Bible Puzzles for Bible notebooking and 25 Map Crosswords for geography notebooking.

Of course, there are loads of places to find free printable puzzles online as well. If you have a printer, you can have dozens of relevant puzzles in just minutes. Here are a few good sites:

Ocean Lapbook20

Laminated Puzzles for an Ocean Lapbook

 

To find the best puzzles, use a good search engine, and enter the type of puzzle you want (word search, scrambled letters, or crossword, for example) plus the topic you are studying. The word printable is useful too; otherwise you may find online puzzles that aren’t helpful for notebooking.

Personalize the printed puzzles by encouraging your child to illustrate it or make notes around it.

Homemade Puzzles for Homeschool Notebooks

theme puzzle

A Homemade Jigsaw Puzzle

Even better than pre-printed puzzles is having your child make the puzzles himself. To create a puzzle requires a careful analysis of  words, planning of a layout, and then carrying through with creative expression.

Use these puzzle making helps:

  1. jigsaw template
  2. graph paper for crossword puzzles or word searches
It does take more time than simply solving a puzzle, but the educational benefit is greater. So at the end of your next lesson or unit study, assign the creation of a crossword puzzle instead of a written narration. Designing the layout and writing the clues will be a great overview for your child.

Storing Puzzles in Your Notebooks

One page puzzles can be hole punched or placed into a page protector. Puzzles with pieces can be stored in ziplock bags or envelope pockets.

If you have ever found your notebooks growing boring, just stay tuned to this series as you see how varied they can be. There are at least fifty different ways!

 

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Jimmie Quick

Jimmie is now a veteran homeschool mom. Her daughter Emma is a student of the sciences at a large university in Illinois. Her guide to notebooking—Notebooking Success—guides you through notebooking: what it is; how to use it; how it fits a Charlotte Mason, classical, and textbook curriculum; tips for getting the most educational value from it; and much more. It comes bundled with several bonuses, including a small set of generic notebooking pages that can be used with any topic.

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