LAPBOOK

NIKOLINA PRANJIĆ
 What is a lapbook?

A lapbook is an inexpensive portfolio or collection of

mini-books, flaps, and folded display material, that
provides interactive space for drawings, stories,
graphs, graphics, timelines, diagrams, and written
work, from any topic, unit study, book you choose,
gathered, glued, and creatively displayed in a colored
standard sized cardboard folder, often folded in a
“shutter-fold” , that fits in your lap.
Johanna Whittaker (c) 2008
The term “Lap Book” was first coined by Tammy
Duby, a homeschool mother and a writer from
Virginia, USA.

She named it that because the whole project could fit

into a “book” that fits in the child’s lap.
Lapbooking can be done at any age and with any
subject. Lapbooks can cover everything from
fractions to the Revolutionary War.
 Lapbooks can focus on a specific topic, such as
Christmas, or serve as a reference tool for various
skills, like basic grammar facts. You could make a
lapbook to go along with your foreign language
program, creating mini books that serve as
reminders for vocabulary and sentence structure.
 Themes

They can cover themes like holidays, science, animals,

deal with specific time and place, and also character
qualities.

It is a great way to explore countries and cultures.

 Children can learn all about languages, traditions, food,
clothing, landmarks, and daily life

A lapbook might accompany a unit study, elaborate on a

book or serve as a guidebook.
Four reasons why teachers should use lapbooks
in their lessons:
1. Visualizing
A lap book is structured similarly to the
way our brains function by allowing
associations to be recorded. While
creating the lap book, ideas and
thoughts are turned into something
visible and structured. Lap booking is
an excellent way of storing information,
but also presenting them to others.
It is said that a picture is worth a
thousand words. “Living colour” does
more than appeal to the senses. Colour
helps us to process and store images
more efficiently.
2.Interactive
 Interactive learning focuses on
the subject instead of the
teacher. The student and
teacher work together as a team.
In that way students can apply
what they learn. It can be called
learning by doing.
 This type of learning suits
visual, auditive and tactile type
of students (They see, touch
and hear what they read and
write about).
3.Interesting
A lap book project is fun and
entertaining. Most people like
“crafty” projects. It is proven
that people cannot learn by
having information pressed
into their brains. It must be
inserted willingly, and that
spark is human curiosity. The
student begins to do his or
her own thinking rather than
just accepting someone else's.
4.Practicing brain skills
Lap booking brings together
left brain thinking (words,
logic) and right-brain skills
(images, colour). The brain
likes to work on the basis of
association and it will
connect every idea, memory
or piece of information to
other ideas and concepts.
 EQUIPMENT

1. FILE FOLDERS
2. CARD STOCK
PAPER ( WHITE AND COLOURED )

ADHESIVES ( STICKY TAPE, DOUBLE-SIDED

STICKY TAPE, DRY GLUE STICK )

VARIETY OF PENS AND PENCILS, COLOUR OR

WATERCOLOUR PENCILS, RULER,

CUTTERS ( SCISSORS, PAPER/PRINT CUTTER,

PAPER PUNCH, A CRAFT KNIFE, FANCY EDGING
SCISSORS ).
You should also need topic-related (source) materials,
brochures, handouts, postcards, pictures or graphics.

Realia like a shell or sand can also be added in.

Embelishments are fun to decorate with. You can use buttons,
ribbons, stamps, eyelets, stickers, etc.

Lapbook supplies don’t need to be expensive. As it is said,

“Necessity is the Mother of Invention” and some of the most
creative ideas need little or no money. Look around your
house and in your craft stash. What can be recycled, reused,
or repurposed?

A picture is worth a thousand words
 BENEFITS

a fantastic hands-on educational tool

 highly interactive – from the creation to the finished product. Each component of the lapbook
has given the learner an opportunity to concentrate on a specific aspect of the greater topic

Making books with students is an effective way to cement and document their learning.

 It also becomes an effortless review tool. Your students will want to go back and look through
their books. They will read again their entries, reinforcing this knowledge and shifting it into
permanent storage in their brains.

a lapbook motivates even the most reluctant learner

easy and fun to make

Multi-age classrooms – Lapbooks can be adapted to any age group

 Differences- four educational books
educational books fall into four basic categories:
 Journal
 Notebook
 Lapbook
 Scrapbook

Any of these books can be made on a low budget, or they can be

made quite expensively. They can be elaborate in their design, or
very simple.
 A journal holds the compilation of
a child’s thoughts, reflections, or
research on a given subject.

A notebook is a collection of loose sheets

containing various types of information
assembled together to form a cohesive
story and is ideally suited for
chronological history study.
A lapbook, also known as a
shutterbook, is a file folder with the
two tabs folded into the center, like
a window shutter effect. They can
contain games, vocabulary words,
pictures, maps, recipes and clipart
whilst scrapbooks are generally
created in a pre-made scrapbook
album.
 Results

this type of learning suits visual, auditive and tactile

type of students (They see, touch and hear)
even the most reluctant learners get motivated

learners with special difficulties also respond positively

students are more likely to remember the information

because they had fun while making it
spices up monotonous lectures
 CONCLUSION

Lapbooking is a great way to guide our teens through research, note-taking, and
information-organising processes.

Children who are not afraid to fail while trying and discovering will be the next great
inventors, problem solvers or leaders.
Through researching, planning, assembling, and completing lapbooks, our children
learn the information they want or need to learn. In that way we hand over the
responsibility of planning from us, the educators, on to our children, learners. They
learn to control the process and also the content.

Each lapbook is an original creation, different according to topic and creator, and
a treasure for years to come.

Remember, there is no right or wrong way to lapbook. We need to raise our children
to be critical thinkers who love to learn. Instilling the love of discovery and learning
is the key to successful education.
You don't have to be a super- creative teacher

The best way to begin is to just dig right in

There are dozens of fantastic resources available

THANK YOU