Tour 2: Quarter 1 Science- Botany Lapbook

Tour 2: Quarter 1 Science- Botany Lapbook

I’m excited to present to you… a Botany Lapbook!  Instead of posting individual pieces each week, the whole lapbook is here in this one post. That way if you’re a planner you can print it all out ahead of time!

Here’s a glimpse of what it looks like finished:

19 compelted lapbook

Excited to get started? Yay me too!

First download the file:

Download the Botany lapbook

The instructions are included in the download, but I’ll break them down week by week for you here, to match the tour guide. Plus add my two cents worth of discussion topics to have with your students while you’re lapbooking.

A Note about the Lapbooks: 

Lapbooks can be a fun and interactive way for students to learn- lots of teachers both in and out of the school system are using them these days.  And they are a fun way to review material you’ve already covered.  Don’t feel pressured to make your lapbook look exactly like the pictures.  The most important thing is that your students are learning and having fun! If they want to put pieces in different places, color it differently or make their own additions, go for it!  Lastly, if you have several students, you can either let them each make their own (if they can cut and glue by themselves) OR you can make one lapbook as a family.

First print everything you need:

Printing:

Print the cover (pg 5), picture of the plant (pg 6), and leaf cards (pg 15-17) one sided on regular copy paper

Print the roots and transpiration flip pages (pg 7-8), the parts of a flower fold out (pgs 10-11), the seed dispersion (pg 12-13), and the two types of trees foldouts (pg 18-19) two sided (flip on the long side of the paper) on cardstock.

Print the photosynthesis slider and leaf (pg 9) one sided on card stock.

 

Week 1:


To make your lapbook, open up your file folder and fold the sides inward. (I used green!)

1 open file folder

2 fold inward

Color and/or label the picture of the plant. Add a sunshine and rain if you wish. Glue to the inside middle of the lapbook.

3 flower picture

Cut out the ‘Roots’ booklet page, fold in half and color the front. Glue stick over the matching roots section of the flower picture.

Cut out the ‘Transpiration’ flip page, fold in half and glue stick over the bottom leaf on the right side.

5 transpirationTalk about it:

Discuss the memory work this week.  Why do you suppose roots branch off so much? Why do they grown downward? Why does the plant pick up water in the roots just to let it go through the stomata in the leaf?  Taylor your discussion to your age group.  Younger students can just learn the names of the parts of the plant this week- roots, leaves, flower, stem, and maybe that roots pick up nutrients.  Challenge your older students to learn more about transpiration and stomata.

Week 2


 

Cut out the ‘Photosynthesis’ Leaf with tabs, and the slider with CO2 and O2 on it. Flip over the leaf, set the slider on top, and fold the tabs over. They may overlap the slider a little. Place glue dots on the tabs and secure the leaf with slider to the picture of the flower in the center of your lapbook, such that it is over the bottom left leaf.

7 photosynthesis slider

8 photosynthesis slider glued

9 photosynthesis slider o2

Talk about it:

Now you can pull the tab to ‘see’ the carbon dioxide (CO2) go into a leaf and Oxygen (O2) come out!  Explain this is how the plant makes it’s ‘food’ and energy- it’s called Photosynthesis.  When we feel low on energy we eat a snack, but a plant must rely on the CO2 in the air and sunlight to make it’s energy.

Where does CO2 come from? Does anyone remember learning about the respiratory system last year? Did you know we breath in oxygen and breath out carbon dioxide? What would happen if there were no plants on earth?!

Week 3


Cut out the parts of a flower. Color and fold the petals inward, such that “Parts of a Flower” is on top. Glue stick into the top left side of the lapbook.

6 flower fold

10 parts of flower

Talk about it:

Have a discussion about pollination with your students this week.  What happens when a flower is pollinated?  Who does the pollination? Go outside and see if you can find some pollinating insects- bees, wasps, or butterflies (don’t touch them!).  If you have a garden, now would be a great time to show how once a flower is pollinated, it grows a fruit! What’s inside the fruit?  (seeds!)

Week 4


Cut out around the ‘Seed dispersal’ flip page. Cut the solid lines inward, and fold into a trifold with the title on the front. Glue stick to the upper right side of the lapbook.

11 seed dispersal 12 seed dispersal

13 seed dispersal placement

Talk about it:

Discuss seed dispersal with your students this week.  Why do seeds need to be dispersed? Why are there so many ways for seeds to be dispersed? Have any of your students seen a coconut? How about a dandelion? You could go to a park and watch for squirrels, now is about the time they start burying acorns and other tree nuts for the winter. God designed the animals and plants to all work together- isn’t it amazing?

Week 5


Cut out the ‘Leaf Classification’ Pocket. Fold the side tabs over, and secure together using glue dots. (Glue stick may work also– but wait for it to dry completely before gluing to the Lapbook). Glue stick the pocket to the bottom right side of your lapbook. Cut out your leaf classification cards and place in the pocket.

14 Leaf Classification pocket

16 leaf cards

15 leaf classification pocket placement

Talk about it:

Have your students draw some of their own leaves on the blank cards.  Either collect examples from your own yard, or let their imagination take over.  Once they’ve drawn a leaf make sure they label the type, venation, and arrangement!  Why do we classify leaves? Do the names make sense to you?

Week 6


Cut out the two types of trees fold outs. For the Evergreen tree, color both the outside and inside tree green. For the deciduous tree color the outside tree green, and color the inside tree orange/yellow/red, and add leaves that have fallen to the ground. Glue to the left side of the Lapbook.

 

16 tree types

17 tree types

Go outside and see what type of trees are around your house.  Do you have more deciduous or evergreen trees?

Finish up your Lapbook with a snazzy cover and by hole punching it.

Glue the cover to the front. If you glue one side first, you can use the edge of the file folder as a guide to cut on. Then glue on the other side.

20 glue on the cover

To make the lapbook fit into a 3 ring binder, run some packing tape along the left side. Fold over such that some of the tape sticks to itself. Hole punch through the tape, and store in your science binder.

21 tape on edge of lapbook

22 hole punched lapbook

Yay you’ve finished a botany lapbook.  Enjoy reviewing each week’s memory work with the fun flip outs in your lapbook!  Thank you for joining me.

7 Comments on “Tour 2: Quarter 1 Science- Botany Lapbook

    • I don’t think this is too young for 10-11 year olds. Kids have a great ability to take things to their level. Make adjustments to engage their level as you see the reaction of your student. As kids get older they can be encouraged to do more pieces themselves, using less templates and provided outlines. In the botany lapbook, they can write all the labels and find or draw their own examples, making their lapbook unique, rather than an exact reproduction of the one provided.

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