Interactive Student Notebooks

I teach 7th grade reading full-time and have for the past six years. This year, I tried something new, and that was implementing the use of Interactive Student Notebooks, or ISNs. I did not come up with this idea, but a number of teachers in my building use it, so my science teacher and I decided to try it with our classes this year. Basically, it's a notebook in which students keep...well, everything! Notes, handouts, graphic organizers, you name it - it goes in the ISN. In the front, students keep a table of contents. Mine looks something like this:

For instance, on page 10 of the ISN, the students put into practice a note-taking strategy called Power Notes (and BTW, I heart Power Notes), which is a way to organize important information by delineating between main ideas and details.  On the left is the article they were given, which they highlighted using the number system with colors, and on the right are their notes:

 Next week we are starting research (which I hate), but I am looking forward to utilizing the ISN as an organizational tool for my kids. (For a great and more detailed explanation of the ISN, click here.) Definitely a new thing I will be using next year.

Take Aways:

• I LOVE LOVE LOVE THIS TOOL! I can't even remember how I taught without it!
• It completely eliminates "Uh...I can't find my notes" or "I lost the sheet" or "Someone stole my assignment (really?)" EVERYTHING goes in the notebook. 
• Grade the kid's assignment before it gets glued in the ISN. If you don't, instead of grading a stack of 119 papers, you have to grade multiple stacks of 119 notebooks. At least I know for next time!