This week we worked on a special project – a lapbook all about Denmark. Why Denmark? Olivia’s daddy is currently deployed, and in his job he gets to work with lots of international people. One of his good friends over yonder is from Denmark. The project started as a special request from JP to show Olivia on the world map where all his co-workers are from and evolved into this lapbook.

I have to admit that this was a huge labor of love on my part. I wanted it to look really good…so I did all of the cutting and most of the gluing. Also, Olivia isn’t ready to write whole sentences on her own yet, so any writing was done by me. We plan to do a few more of these, however, I may change it up a bit so more of the work is done by her…I keep reminding myself it’s about the process!

Work in Progress…

We started out by learning what the Denmark flag looks like. We also included the Polish and German flag because we’ll be learning about those countries next. I printed off the European Flag nomenclature cards and Europe Geography Folder from Montessori Printshop. Then we had a flag Montessori lesson and I showed her pictures of Denmark.

Next we worked on identifying where Denmark is located. First, she found Europe, and then she found Denmark. We used our Leap Frog Tag Reader World Map at first. This works great because as she points to different countries she can instantly hear from her Tag Reader if she has found the correct one…very helpful since I couldn’t see what she was pointing at since she was on top of the map.

After finding it on the big world map, she then had to find it and color it on her miniature map for the lapbook. At first she insisted she couldn’t do it, but after a second look at the big map and some encouraging words she did it all by herself.

Gluing down her Flag Facts I got from Homeschool Share. I already had all the facts written down inside, so we just talked about the different facts before she glued it down.

We also happened to be talking about Hans Christian Andersen from Denmark for our Literature Fairy Tales unit, so we included 2 Famous People pockets (also from the Homeschool Share website). The first famous person was Hans Christian Andersen, and the second was JP’s co-worker. On the inside of the pockets are facts of the famous person and a picture. JP sent a picture of him with his Danish friend. This part actually brought tears to Olivia’s eyes as she kissed the picture of JP. She said, “Every time I open this I’ll think of daddy.” It was a good moment to stop and pray for JP and all those fighting in this war.

Danish numbers 1 – 10. This pocket was also from the Home School Share website. On one side of the flap I had the numeral written. Then I gave her slips of paper with the written Denmark number and she had to glue them on the back of the correct flap.

Here she is gluing down the Denmark alphabet. The pocket is also from Homeschool Share. I printed out a copy of their alphabet and had her identity the 3 additional letters and color them. She then glued the alphabet inside and glued the pocket down in the lapbook.

Did You Know? Also, from Homeschool Share. She glued down pictures of Vikings, Legos, and the first Amusement Park.

What’s Cooking? Again…the blank template is from Homeschool Share, and then in Word I created a Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner menu. I laminated the cards and we played a guessing game. I read what was on the menu and she had to guess which meal I was describing.

Finished Product…

Front Cover with picture of flag and country.

Inside flaps. I ended up adding the flap in the middle that opens upward so we would have enough room for everything. It’s just another file folder cut in half and then taped on.