Back to Home School: Mini Office

Well, it's that time of year again, Back to School!  Or Home School for my kids. If your kids are anything like mine, they probably hate sitting next to each other to do school work.  There isn't a minute that goes by that I don't hear, "get off MY side of the table!" or "Stop looking at my paper!"  So after doing some searching on the interwebs, I ran into "mini-offices," and thought it would be a great solution to a couple the issues that the kids have.  This concept reminds me of back in elementary school, during state testing the teachers would take file folders and stood them up so we could have privacy dividers. Except these folders can be decorated or even better made into a reference source by adding all the information your child needs to refer to during a typical day.

For Teenie I chose some phonics sheets and math concepts that she is currently working on, and also some things that she is having issues with such as a skip counting chart.  For Sonshine I found liquid measurement conversion charts, prime and composite numbers chart and Roman numerals. I have found a great deal of information just by googling "free mini office printable" or by typing in what I was looking for specifically i.e. "printable periodic table of elements."  The beauty of these mini offices are that you can make specific ones for specific subjects, or if you are lazy like me, just make one that has all of the general information that your kid might need.  Either way it's win-win, because eventually after referring to the information and seeing it over and over, the kids will start to memorize it!

All you need to make these is 2 new or used file folders (or more if you need a bigger office), a glue stick and some printable (check out the links at the end of this post)
 I used 3 folders per kid.

 All you do is open up the folders and overlap them glue them in place with a glue stick and let dry.  When they are dry you can reinforce with clear packing tape.

Add your information and you're good to go. (Cute kid cameo apperence by Sonshine).

 

 Here's a close up of the mini office I made for Teenie.

Laminating will make them last longer, but is not necessary. You can also use strips of clear packing tape (get it from the dollar store) to "laminate" as well.  Kids can them personalize the front cover by using stickers or markers.
 
Some links to get you started:
Busy Teacher Cafe
Nicholas Academy
Maths Charts