Our homeschool group has participated in, or hosted, a geography fair several times in the 7 years we've lived here. For the last two years our group chose to take a Christmas Around the World theme and hold it in December instead. We have always enjoyed the geography fairs, usually sharing about countries from our heritage or countries that we have artifacts from because a family member has been there. This year we were out of options.
We couldn't decide what country to present because we just didn't have any experience or inspiration left. We dug out a book we have which includes information about Christmas in a few countries and our 8 year old daughter started trying to find them on the wall map. Along the way, she found Madagascar and was excited to recognize the country from the movies. A couple of the younger kids excitedly begged to do Christmas in Madagascar. At first I told them no because I didn't know anything about that country. I finally did a quick google search, just to see if it would be possible. Was there any information out there?
We actually found several web pages with some fun information and decided we'd talk about Madagascar. We didn't really have time to put it together until the day before the event, but we had fun printing out maps, pictures of some animals unique to Madagascar, typing up facts about the country itself, and their Christmas holiday. We made a display and even found some fun coloring sheets to print out for the younger kids. My 8 year old and 15 year old daughters did most of the work (with their 6 year old brother) and they presented it to the group, as well. I wish the boys would have gotten more involved, but they didn't this time. At least they learned about some other countries when they attended the meeting with us.
As part of the day, we enjoyed a soup potluck with the other families and then one of the moms had a couple different Christmas object lessons and a fun candy giveaway to share with the kids. She did a great job organizing the event this year. We had more people participate last year, but we still enjoyed the day.
Here are a few pictures from our portion of the Christmas Around the World Geography Fair.
The display that my daughters helped create and set up.
It's presentation time. 15 yo C and 8 yo L share about Madagascar with our group.
You get a bonus shot of me preparing to try to sing "O Come All Ye Faithful" in the Malagasy language. Aren't you glad you scrolled down this far?
Even better ... I'll embarrass myself and share the video.
You can go ahead and laugh at me, but be proud of my kids. I'm definitely proud of them! (This video and the pictures are courtesy of my 17 year old daughter.)
Does your homeschool group host a geography fair? Have you ever considered making it a Christmas Around the World event instead?
April E.
