Friday, September 17, 2010

How to Make a Baggy Book

Here's a fun craft to do with your kids, students, Sunday school class or up-and-coming Scrapbooker!

The Supplies for a Baggy Book are simple:  3 or more Zip-lock style sandwich bags; cardstock or poster board; Photos or pictures; Scissors, Marker, Glue (or Glue stick), Stapler and Duct Tape

1) Step one:  Cut Cardstock down to size to fit inside the baggy.
2) Cut out the pictures, as needed.  There are many options - for this example, I just used clip art pictures from my computer.  Real pictures of family members or sights would also be a great tool as well.  Using pictures of family members would be a great way of association for infants and children with learning disabilities.
3) Glue photos on the front and back side of the cut cardstock.
4) Label the pictures, if desired.  The labels could be left off so the child has to remember what the picture is or the picture could be put on the front side and the word on the back so the child could see the picture and also recognize the word.
5) Once all of the pictures are placed on the pages, slide the finished pages into the baggy. Stack all the baggies on top of each other.

6) Staple along the side of the stacked bags.  I chose to do mine along the "open" end.  You could do this along the "sealed" edge instead and reuse the bags for other projects.
7) Once stapled securely, use duct tape to make a "binding" on the book.
Above is the front cover of my book.  The rest of the pages are below:
This is a quick and easy project to do for any unit that is being studied.

1) Young Children - use it to help them learn new words, animals, shapes, colors and more
2) Sunday School - Have the children create one at the end of the unit with a key picture from each lesson; just supply the pictures and have them tell the store in one short sentence.
3) School  - use it for any subject as a study guide or as a project to go along with the lesson.
4) Scrapbookers - If you have a little one who likes to "help" you scrapbook, cut paper to size and give them pictures and scrapbooking glue.  Allow them to scrapbook away and put their finished project in the baggie and make a book!  Think of how proud they will be of this special project which you can also include in your own scrapbook later.