I keep hearing a lot about workboxes? Are they different than lapbooks? Will someone please explain what they are, why you use them, and when? Thanks.
I’m still in my first year homeschooling so a lot of these ideas are still new to me! 
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Hi missdynamo,
There are many different formats to the workboxes because most people tweak it and change it to fit their family’s needs, but the general idea of workboxes is to have a box (or drawer or even folders) for each subject your child is going to do in a given day.
In each box or drawer, you put all of the items needed for that subject (books, worksheets, manipulatives, etc). Your child begins each day with the first box, completes the required work for that subject, then moves on to the next box. They continue doing that until they’ve completed all of the workboxes.
If there’s ever a subject that they will need your help on, then you put some sort of tag or note telling the kiddos to get help from mom. A lot of people like the workbox method because if you have multiple children, it allows you to work with one child while the other(s) work independently, and without the other children needing to come to you all the time to find out what to do next.
If a child comes to a box where they need mom’s help, and you are busy with another child, the other one can simply skip that box and continue on down the line. It helps keep the kids on task and make the best use of their time.
Here’s a link from COAH explaining how Erica uses workboxes:
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@missdynamo Here is another blog with lots of great info and links about various ways to do workboxes 
Here is that link.
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This is an example of a work box. There are many different ones. Basically you put one subject in each box and your child ‘works’ through their boxes until they are done. I can tell you that it made an enormous difference in my homeschool when I started using them several years ago. I stopped hearing “How much more do I have to do?” My kids know exactly what they needed to do just by looking at the boxes (I use removable labels on them).
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Love it! I watched Erica’s video on workboxes and that explained it well! Thanks for all the info and links.
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