Besides the binders, many teachers request notebooks for each subject. The variety of notebooks offered today can be overwhelming. We often hear parents say, “I stood in the supply store in front of a sea of different styles of notebooks: single subject, three subject, spiral, marble composition, some with folders, and some without. I couldn’t decide.” So, let’s look at each.
Marble
Remember the plain black and white marble design notebook with the pages stitched into the covers that us baby boomers used in school? That’s the marble notebook. Teachers like these notebooks for young students because of their durability. Students cannot tear pages out of these notebooks as easily as the spiral, and the hard cover makes for a longer lasting book. Young students who are more visual may like the wider spaced lines in these notebooks.
Wider spaced notebook lines will give the student who struggles with penmanship a wider area to write.
Spiral
There are enough varieties of spiral notebooks to make your head spin. They come in single, double, or three subject notebooks. The spiral notebook can be useful for students whose classes require more note-taking, especially in the middle and upper school.
Some spiral notebooks use folders inserted between the pages to indicate where the subjects are divided. We don’t encourage actually using these folders. Rather, the 2-pocket folder we’ve already described in other posts, in the appropriate subject binder is sufficient. Using the notebook folders can just add to the confusion of lost items. Keep it simple!