Tapestry of Grace Part Six: Organizing Tapestry and Notebooks

Hi, my name is Heather, and I'm a compulsive organizer.

"Hi, Heather. . . . "

Not really.  I do have a thing about checking off boxes, though.  But I digress.

Finally back on track, and wanting to finish my Tapestry series that I started . . . . um. . . . a long time ago. . . . . . . I thought I'd tackle the organization topic.  Because, you know, I'm so organized that I have tons of free time to blog and stuff.  Heh.  Anywho.

First, and MOST IMPORTANTLY!!!!!  If you somehow you get the idea that my life is wonderful, beautiful, perfect and organized . . . .  I have some pictures of my bathroom floors I can post for you.  SO there.  (Go back and read this post if you need a refresher course on the dangers of comparison.)

Now that's out of the way.  Where was I?

Here is one approach - my approach - to organizing my Tapestry year.  (Remember, I am a DE TOG user, so that impacts how I organize to some extent.)  I confess, I enjoy purchasing the SAP packs from Lampstand Press - these are the Student Activity sheets already printed for me, so I only have to print reading lists and overview pages.  Beautiful!  I haven't splurged on color yet, but would love to if the old budget allows.  Once I have my SAP packs in hand, I file Units 2-4, by week, in a large file box:

At this point, I don't separate them out by student yet.  That comes when they go into this file drawer:

To start the school year, I put the first unit into my file drawer in the school room.  Each of my kids has a color, and I put their pages in their own folder for the week-plan.  If I'm a good Mommy, I sit down and get all the reading assignments and overview pages printed for the unit - these are not included in the SAP  packs.  (Usually, however, I'm not so on top of it by the 2nd or 3rd Unit - and I'm printing away the night before or - gasp! - the day of our set-up meeting!)

You might notice in the file I also have a file for Evaluations - these are the quizzes and unit exams for my Dialectic and Rhetoric students.  

When it's time for our set-up meeting, I bring our handy-dandy colored folders to the table and - ta dah! - the pages are where they are supposed to be.

Now, a quick word about notebooks:

Some of you have noticed that I don't use 3-ring binders.  Instead I use a system that I originally purchased from Levenger - the Circa notebook system.  Happily, this year I noticed our local Staples carrying a similar system - oh, the joys!!

I love these notebooks because the bindings lay flat, I can rearrange pages at will, and my kids can even punch random notecards, drawings, etc and put them in with their regular size papers.  Here's an up close look at one:

My daughter's Upper Grammar notebook

Opened to show the General Information page.  Note the advanced academic note-taking at the bottom. :p

A map page.  This year, though, the kids made a section in the book just for maps.

Example of an Upper Grammar Literature response page.

And this year I apparently got my act together with vocabulary.  Yay, me!

So there you have it!  A look at our notebook system.

As always, feel free to send me questions or your own ideas through the comment section.  I'd love to help!  Next up:  Writing Aids!

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