At the Geography Fair

This past month my 10yr. old daughter participated in our local homeschool geography fair. It was such a wonderful process and experience that we will definitely do it again next year. Here’s how ours was set up and what we did:

In our area we have a local homeschool network. Any homeschoolers in the area were invited to participate. All they had to do was pick a country they wanted to learn more about and present at the fair. My friend Kristy handled all the details of the event (thanks Kristy!). Our geography fair was held at our local library and are our participants were K-high school. We did not limit the amount of entries for one country. If 3 children wanted to study and present about France, we let them. 🙂

We traveled to England while at our fair. This high-schooler had a creative way of presenting her information. She compared famous people from then to famous people now. I’m not sure how I feel about the Spice Girls being put in the “then” category though. 😉

France was the country of the day! There were three different displays– each one unique and sharing different tidbits. I loved all the memorabilia and the Lego Eiffel tower.

The next stop was Madagascar. Did you know that it is the 4th largest island in the world?

This presenter taught us about escargot. She even had a snail in the jar!

While visiting Thailand, we were able to taste a special drink and see a paper lantern that they use in festivals.

My daughter also picked France to study. She used Amanda Bennett’s unit study of France to help teach her all about the country. I love these unit studies because she can do it on her own and they utilize several different resources such as videos, websites, lapbook elements, books, and notebooking. While learning about France, my daughter was very interested in the artwork and famous artists.

On to Peru… if he could have, this young man would have brought his pet chinchilla for all of us to see. We had to be content with a picture though. 😉

There were several other displays that I somehow missed photographing– Afghanistan, Qatar, Ireland, The Bahamas, and more.

How Do You Plan and Set up a Geography Fair?

We modeled our geography fair after Ami’s from Walking By the Way. She has a ton of tips plus a printable list. Check out her How to Get a Geography Fair going post for more information.

The benefits of participating in the fair were:

– Each student took ownership of their project and spent time learning in-depth about a country.
– Each student creatively shared information on their countries.
– Each student had to present information to those who stopped by their station, thus practicing speech skills.
– Families could participate together.
– It was fun to see other homeschoolers that we don’t normally see on a regular basis.
– The Geography Fair was the perfect opportunity to invite extended family and friends to see what we do.
– Everyone learned more about different cultures.