Season 2, Episode 3
Find Out Why My Students Remember Me Forever
(And of course, it's something you can do too!)
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Today, I've got something special to talk to you about.
I'm not kidding, when I say I'm about to tell you what I did to make all of my students remember me, and the time they spent in Pre-K with me forever.
This is also a way to store and display your students work all year long.
It's a way to document their growth.
And it's the most effective tool that I have found for building language, which we all know is a huge part of the learning goals for Pre-K. (Everybody's always pushing to build the language.)
Well, this is going to be your new favorite way to do it.
And you know how our kids are so little, and they struggle to respond when their families ask them. “What did you do at school today?”
Well, once they flip through the pages of their scrapbooks, they are going to all become little chatterboxes.
Say what?
Yep, today we're talking about scrapbooks.
I'm telling you all about how I do scrapbooks for my students. I know you're going to have tons of questions. And I promise, I'm going to tell you everything.
I kept debating where to start, but I've decided to share some of the benefits, then I'm going to tell you exactly how I do them.
And throughout all of this, I'm going to be giving you tons of tips on how to be efficient so that you don't waste precious time. I know you don't have a lot of that precious time.
So let's get right into it.
The first benefit is the language development that comes with every opportunity that they have to open their scrapbook and flip through the pages.
They want to tell all the details and explain every picture.
If you've got a kid who needs to work on language building, let anyone sit down with that child and their scrapbook… and just watch the excitement as the child flips through the pages.
They have so much to say about their scrapbook because it's a collection of their work.
It has photos of them.
As you add pages, the book grows and the kids get more and more practice talking about what they've made. And you see them expand their vocabulary from month to month. There are so many reasons why kids love these books so much. And you'll get to hear them as I continue to explain how we do them and what goes into them.
The kids are so proud of their scrapbook… it never gets old to them.
Because there are always new things being added to it.
And they love to share it with anyone and everyone.
Here's why you should be making them:
They are great for families to keep them in the loop.
When they come to conferences … Anytime the parents are in the classroom, it's so easy to tell your students “Go get your scrapbook and show mom and dad.”
Whenever I had conferences that would run over, I would already have a backup plan.
I could tell the next family that arrived (as they were standing there waiting, you know, right outside the door staring in the window at us😂)… I would say “Here's your child's scrapbook, you guys can sit and start looking at that while I finish up this other conference.”
👀 And there's always so much for them to look at!
And see, parents are always blown away by how their child can explain what they were doing in the pictures that are in the book or how their child can tell them the names of all the other kids in the photos.
It's a really meaningful way for parents to connect with their kids.
And it helps to bridge that home to school gap that there seems to always be…
So the first year that I ever made these, I got really sad - because I realized that I was spending way too much time on them. And I knew “Darn it. This is cool, but it's not sustainable.” And I was bummed… I knew the next year I wasn't gonna be able to do them. I just it took me too much time. So it came time for the year to end and the graduation ceremony…
And, then — I got to send each of my students home with a scrapbook of their very own to keep forever to always remember their year in Pre-K…
It was such a good feeling to give them their scrapbooks.
And then— I went from being sad, (thinking I wouldn't do them again)
to being nervous — because now, I thought, “Dang it, I know I have to do these again…I knew it… God, I know, I'm gonna do these again, I know, I'm gonna do these again.”
But I can't describe the feeling— you'll know what I'm talking about when you get to send your students home with their book at the end of the year.
So I knew “Okay, darn it, I am going to do this again.”
Now I need to spend time figuring out how to become efficient and not put so much time into the whole process.
Because it was stressful in the beginning, when I didn’t have good routines for putting the scrapbooks together… And I didn't want to do it again — the way that I had done it that first year…
I AM PROUD TO SAY — I have put so much time into figuring out how to work smarter, not harder on these scrapbooks.
That's the only reason that I even feel confident in doing this episode. Because I know that I can share enough tips and ideas with you to make it manageable for you.
So if this is something you decide to do, I'm confident that I can show you trick tricks and tips and all the things to make it manageable.
💚💚💚 A few years into doing these books, I remember going on a home visit. And there was an older sibling that I had had a few years earlier, along with the child that was in my class then and the older sister busted out her scrapbook from when she was in my class. And her parents were like, “She keeps this on her bookshelf in her room still, like she's going into second grade. And she still loves her preschool scrapbook.” That has always stuck with me.
Maybe it's because they don't have anything else like that, at that age? Where it's a huge thing of all of their own stuff. But they just love to look at it, and show it to people and they love to see photos of themselves…and they can tell you all of their friends names.
It's a very special thing for them.
✨And I made one for every child that I ever taught!!!!
👇🏻👇🏾👇🏿 CHECK OUT MY INSTAGRAM FOR QUICK TIPS 👇🏻👇🏾👇🏿
(You get better at it over time)… I made it better year after year—and I’ve perfected the system. So don't worry, I'm sharing a ton of tips with you today, so that you can be super efficient and make it work if you decide to do this for your students.
So it's not typical “scrapbook” in the sense that every page needs to be decorated. I can remember doing scrapbooks when I was a kid and you'd spend a lot of money at the scrapbook store. And you would add stickers and lots of details to every page. These are different…
Their work is the pages…
And you can add little stickers or paper punches if you want.
But you don't have to do any of that.
In fact, I'll tell you the best way to fill any empty spaces and the pages in a minute…
Make it stand out
Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.
3 Ring Binders
So we use three ring binders that I would ask each family to provide.
And I would always ask them to get the biggest one they can find. Because we fill them up.
👉🏼👉🏿👉🏽 Bigger is always better, I would recommend a two inch binder at least.
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Front Covers
I’d have each kid decorate a colored piece of cardstock with their picture on it for the front cover:
✨ We always used very exciting art materials to make the front covers of their scrapbooks VERY SPECIAL!
This is a scrapbook I’m making for our neighbor… whenever she comes over and does activities, I keep them and put them in her scrapbook!
If the binders don't have the clear page cover, (if they get the less expensive ones that don't have that clear covering) - Then I would just laminate that page and I would hot glue it to the front. And it would work just as well as the binders that come with that clear page protector.
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And the whole process of looking through scrapbooks becomes a teachable moment.
I was very specific with how I taught the kids to hold and carry their scrapbooks, how it taught them to turn the pages, they can be very careful with these precious books. And those lessons that I did with them would transfer over and they would show their families how to be careful with the pages to when they would get to look at them together.
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So we would have our three ring binders.
And I would take the pages of their work and I would hot glue them — back to back to each other or if there was a less than a full page I would just hot glue that to a piece of cardstock paper.
One thing that I did buy for the scrapbooks: Cardstock
I would buy a bunch of cardstock at the beginning of the year when it's on sale. I buy the multipacks from Hobby Lobby with all the different colors and that's what I would use to strengthen the pages and then I would hot glue their work on to those pieces of cardstock.
I will put most pages together by hot gluing their full size papers to a piece of cardstock and then using the three hole punch to make the initial holes and then I will go back over those holes with a bigger circle punch.
This is a very important step!!
👉🏿👉🏽👉🏻 To get a bigger circle punch to make those holes first I would just punch it with a normal standard three ring binder hole punch, but then I would go back over each hole with a bigger paper punch and make the holes.
So the holes originally like up a fourth of an inch, and I would go over them with an either 5/8 of an inch or 3/4 of an inch punch. (That's the size of the circle) You just want to make those circles a little bigger.
^^ See how the holes are bigger? It makes the pages much easier to turn!
^^ This is a blue piece of paper, hot glued to the back of the green piece of paper you see below it… Then I use the bigger paper punch to make the holes bigger so the pages will turn easily.
And once you make the holes bigger, it makes the pages easy for the kids to turn.
Then, you practice how to turn them carefully and the kids are really good at being responsible and respectful with their books, because they love them so much.
I'll put a link in the show notes for the hole punches I used.
And yes, I went over each hole with the bigger punch, because it makes the page turning a lot smoother.
If you leave the normal three hole punch sized holes, the pages are going to rip!!
Trust me on the golden system — cardstock and punch the bigger holes!
The kids are growing along with their books… And as the books get bigger, the kids do too.
They will get really good at being careful turning the pages…
They can handle the expectations. And they love their books.
📢 Warning Warning 📢
Don't make this huge mistake that I did:
❌ You DO NOT have to take home each child’s scrapbook to work on them…
When I started this, I would be loading binders in my car each weekend. I would be dragging a huge IKEA bag of scrapbooks home. It was such a pain in the butt.
👉🏿👉🏽👉🏻 DO THIS INSTEAD:
All you need to do is take home the pages of your student’s work that you’re going to turn into scrapbook pages.
I used extra folders that I had laying around. And I would take each child’s stack of paper that needed to be turned into scrapbook pages, and I’d tuck it into one pocket of the folder (to keep each child’s work together)… so I’d just have 3 or 4 folders to take home with me. Then, I’d turn those papers into scrapbook pages (by hot gluing them together - back to back and making the bigger hole punches)
And I’d bring the pages back to put in their books.
There's no reason to be lugging the binders back and forth. I would complete the pages, bring them to school and snap them in their binders.
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Tips For Photos
The photos are probably the best part for the kids.
They love seeing pictures of themselves, working hard or playing with their friends.
And that's when these scrapbooks become a real tool for language building.
Sometimes during naptime. I would just sit and look through a book with one of the kids and I would ask them questions about their work or about the pictures in their book. And then I would write their quotes on these little white cheap labels that you can get. (It’s just basically like a white sticker.) And I would write what they say, so that I could stick their little captions in. And it really makes it gives it a “scrapbook feel.”
I know, you're wondering…”Do I have to take and print tons of photos of each kid?”
That sounds like so much time… And the answer to that is “No”
I did do a lot of pictures. But yes, you're right, it was time consuming.
I would print pictures of kids each month, cut them out, and file them into their little scrapbook mailbox, so that I know those pictures were going to go into the scrapbooks.
And my para would help me with a lot of that — she would help me cut and sort and organize their pictures so that I could easily bring them home with me and my little folders to get them turned into pages.
I have a few Pro Tips here for ya...
📷 Photo Tip # 1-
So here's a pro tip so that you can still get photos into the books without having to print and cut and sort photos of every kid for every event.
If you go on a field trip or do something worth sharing in their books (like on Halloween, all the kids would come dressed up — So, at some point in the day, I would get everyone together and we would take a group pic.)
And then I would just print that full page group photo, and I'd make enough copies to send one home with families and to put into their scrapbooks.
Families love having those printed photos to hang on the fridge.
BONUS TIP: Print them on different colored paper— 🎃 If it's Halloween, print them on orange paper and send them home for families to hang up. Families always appreciate those, I print a stack to send home and I print another stack to file away for each child's scrapbook. So then as they flip through, they'd see a big photo on pink paper of the class and say, “Oh, that was Valentine's Day!” 🌷 (Or whatever it might have been.)
📷 Photo Tip # 2-
If there's an event that you want to document for every child…
✔ Take a few group style photos, making sure that every kid is in at least one of photos.
✔ Then, you take those five or six or 10 pictures-
✔ Put them into a Word document
✔ Add a title at the top (Throw in a caption or two, if you want.)
✔ Then, JUST Print copies for every child’s scrapbook
📷 Photo Tip # 3-
✔ Print one photo
✔ Use it for every child’s scrapbook
Here are 2 ways of doing this:
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You can do photos on a smaller scale.
You can use the same photo for every kid:
For example, if you have a reader that comes from the public library… you can take a photo on the day he hands out books for each child to take home… and then print that photo and type up the caption: “We're so lucky that Mr. Smith, who comes to read from us brought us all a special gift a copy of Please Mr. Penguin.”
Then you can print those for each child’s book…
You can make copies of that single little photo with the caption and insert it into everyone's book doesn't always have to be a full page deal.
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I have tons of little ideas for you. (Like I've got endless ideas for the scrapbooks.)
And I'm gonna give them to you now, but I don't want to overwhelm you.
If you hear all of these ideas and think “Oh God, I want to do it all.”
But you can't —
👍🏿👍🏻👍🏽 IT’S TOTALLY FINE!!!
👉🏿👉🏽👉🏻Stop… evaluate what you can really handle and start somewhere.
Then, later this year or next school year, you can come back and listen to this episode again and add in some of these other ideas that you didn't want to take on the first round.
And that's totally fine!!!
You have to make this scrapbook operation work for you.
Because if not, you're going to hate me. And I'm going to be very sad. Please just take on what you can.
And I'm always here to help you know that.
So here we go with some other little ideas:
The first one is what I told you, I was gonna tell you about before how to fill empty space in the best way ever…
✔ Print Step By Step Drawing Supports …
✔ Cut up little bright pieces of paper
✔ Leave them on the table and let kids draw on the tiny colored pieces of paper
See how nicely they fill up the extra space:
^^^ They end up being the cutest little drawings to add in and fill in the pages where you have empty space.
👉🏿👉🏽👉🏻 If you missed my blog post about How I Teach My Kids To Draw, (even when I can't draw) — Check It Out HERE!
✨ Paper Punch Decorations
You can buy paper punches, if you want to add a little seasonal touch throughout the pages.
Then, you use construction paper to punch little orange and black pumpkins for October🎃, or red and pink hearts for February🌷…Very simple decor.
Because most of the book is their work. They can always go back through and decorate or draw in any open space. It's also fun to have them go back and try to sound out words or add letters and labels to the things in their scrapbook.
But I also love paper punches for so many other things.
If you buy them for the scrapbooks, you'll find that you use them all different ways in your classroom.
I would punch the hearts for February and do all different kinds of fine motor, and sorting and lots of different activities with them. Because it's an easy way to just take construction paper and make festive things for different times of the year.
The scrapbooks are the perfect tool to document growth.
I cannot stress this enough. You're making a scrapbook keepsake for your kids. But you're also making a full portfolio of each kiddo that can be referenced anytime of the year for any reason.
If a parent has concerns about the way that they're writing, it's just a tool for you to be able to pull out and say, “Well, you know, let's look let's look at how they were writing at the beginning of the year. And let's look at the progression.”
And it's all right there.
📌 Another Big Tip: I never let my scrapbooks leave the classroom.
One year I had a parent who took the book after our first round of conferences, and I didn't even realize that she had taken it until later. But I was looking at the shelf like, “Where is this kid’s scrapbook?” because we always keep them in the same spot.
Check out how I stored and displayed the scrapbooks in my classroom:
I had to track down that parent and say, “I'm sorry, but I need you to bring the scrapbook back.” And it was funny because she was like “You're gonna add more?!!” And I was just like “Hahaha, You have no idea how crazy this book is gonna get!”
Use Scrapbooks As A Center
A fun thing to do with the scrapbooks is to make them into a center that the kids can pick to go to so at different points during the year.
I would allow them to choose to go to “scrapbooks” during center time. And that just meant they pick up their scrapbook, take it to a table or to the floor … and they get to sit and flip and look through their scrapbook. Sometimes they’ll do it with a friend and they will sit and look through them together. They love to just take a little walk down memory lane, showing each other their work and their pictures and just laughing and talking.
It’s always a really popular center that my kids love to go to.
And I don't have to set anything up. I don't have to prepare anything.
It's just: go get your scrapbook and take a look at it…
(Which could probably come in handy at some other times that I can't think of right now. But there's got to be a moment where it's like, “Oh, okay, I could just have them all look at the scrapbooks for a few minutes. And they'll be kept busy.” And you know, buy yourself some time in case you need that someday!)
I've said it a little bit, but you have to make this manageable for you.
You can certainly get help from family volunteers or from your para, with most of the tasks. You have to weave some simple steps into your weekly routine, so that you can stay up on the scrapbooks. (And not have it be something that's just always lingering over you that you are dreading or that you're super behind on because that's going to make it the whole thing stressful.)
So decide how much time you can reasonably put towards these and go with it.
If you want to spend two hours every weekend or every other weekend…great, you'll make amazing scrapbooks.
If you don't have the time right now to take this on…. I don't blame you at all. It's a lot.
And even if you don't do every little bonus feature of them, it's still going to take a good amount of time.
But I want you to keep listening.
Because if you're on the fence, I think you'll be convinced that these are worthwhile.
I'm going to link to my Amazon store in the show notes where I've put all the supplies that you've heard me talk about, there are so many ideas throughout this episode, to try to help you have an easier time with all of this.
There's a lot of ways to make it a smooth operation.
🌠 The takeaway here is: these can be whatever you want them to be!
👉🏻If you decide to try them for a year, and you only get whatever amount of pages in, they will still be great.
👉🏿And then next year, you can try to take on a little bit more, as you've figured out what systems work for you.
👉🏽Maybe you put a few pages in at the end of each month, it will still be magical, and the kids will love it.
👉🏼 Maybe you have parents that have been bothering you about volunteering and you haven't had anything for them to do while law. They can definitely help with scrapbooks.
How do you decide which papers go in the scrapbooks?
You want to pick things that are special.
And then you just sort of decide how to prioritize…. If you pick one certain cutting practice that they did, then you don't need five other cutting practice pages to show their cutting skills. Do you know what I mean?
You'll find a rhythm to this.
And if you end up putting in too many pages, and you have to pull some out and send them home — It's not a big deal.
You'll find a happy medium, you'll you'll know which pages are worth putting in saving.
Basically, what stuff would they hang up on the fridge at home? 👉🏿👉🏽👉🏻 You put that stuff into the scrapbook.
💛 Families appreciate the scrapbooks more than you will ever know.
Because every week as you send home piles and piles of a child's work.
No one knows what to do with all that stuff.
Some families might hang it on the fridge for a while… But those papers end up all over the place. And there's no way to really cherish them.
There's no way to really see the growth that's happening. I mean, you can see it, but it's crumpled up on the bottom of their book bags. Kids pull it all out when they get home. The parents might not even see some of this stuff.
The scrapbooks, organize everything for them.
They get to sit down and flip through the pages and see the beginning of the year when the child could barely write.
And then as they move through the book, they see “wow, look at this, you wrote your name here!”
And then they keep going and soon the child's writing their name really well. And then there are numbers and words. And by the end of the year, you get to look back and see where they started… and where they got to. And that child feels so much accomplishment.
AND THEN, you add the photos — and oh my gosh, look how tiny you were!!!
It just makes the memories and the experiences and the learning that you've done all year with these kids so tangible.
They can feel it.
They can remember it.
They can see it.
They can cherish it — all of it.
And years later, I'd see my students all grown up. And I would hear how they still have their preschool scrapbook, and how they still remember me and how they still talk about me, in the present tense as if they were still there with me.
