Speaking of fires and printing books

We had our first fire of the season in our stove today. I'm not sure it was extremely cold outside but inside I was freezing. (Of course, as my husband will say, I am the ONLY one freezing). At any rate, it was warm and cozy and I look forward to many more such evenings as this as winter approaches here in the north!! And while I'm on the subject of fires my girls have been reading these wonderful little books called Campfire Girls. They can be printed from the internet and here is are a couple tips I use when I print books from the computer.

I like to use both sides of the paper if at all possible. For the first 2 books in the series I printed out book one, then I simply turned the paper over and printed book two on the other side. I then place the paper in sheet protectors and place in a 3 ring binder. (right photo)

The children are used to reading my printed books in this way but it may seem a bit tricky at first. I keep 2 books in one binder. On the front page of each sheet protector is book one and on the backside of each sheet protector is book 2. So, in a sense they 'skip' a page in between each page read. When they are finished with the first book they simply read the page on the backside of each sheet protector.

I also have another tip I use that help keeps each book in order. The first book in the binder I print in the normal fashion, then I flip the paper over in the printer and print the second book by changing the orientation setting on my printer to print it more in a landscape fashion. Then there is no confusion whatsoever when a child turns pages. They easily see where they are because one page is sideways and the other is right side up. The younger children's books work well this way as they tend to get a bit more confused. By seeing the page sideways they know they are to continue on the opposite side where the pages are 'normal.' Then when they finish book one they turn the notebook and read in that fashion for the second book.

We choose our books to print from Old Fashioned Education, Project Gutenberg, or from our A2 cd or our Robinson Curriculum cds. All are great books from years ago when books weren't so watered down as they are now. These books are also choice for learning vocabulary. As shown in the photo above left each of the children has a copybook in which words they come across and don't know the meaning of are written down from each chapter. In this way, their vocabulary words are literally custom made to fit each child and no other vocabulary curriculum is needed.

For printing needs we use the Brother HL 5370 DW that came recommended way back when I

bought my Robinson Curriculum. It works great. Prints quickly and you get many, many pages from one ink cartridge. I so much prefer holding an actual book in my hands while rather than looking at the computer. In some cases we do need to use both if there is more than one child reading the same book though.