Art/History/Science Fair

Some wonderful ladies in our homeschool group organized an Art/History/Science Fair.  It was held at the group's home parish, Holy Rosary in Portland.  

What a wonderful event!  These ladies did a LOT of work to make this special for the kids!  First, they provided rubrics (grading scale) to make this a real competition, just like in the group schools.  Second, they created name tags, flyers, awards certificates, and participation prizes all with the same color scheme and graphics, which went a long way is having the event feel "professional."  And lastly…they bought REAL ribbons for first/second/third places.  It was amazing!

Each of my 3 older kids chose their topic and we discussed how that would translate to a poster board display.  We decided what information should be on the displays and how we would present that info.  In Mariposa's case, I made printed "worksheets" that she filled in.  For Bunny, we talked about what she would present and how it would all fit on the board.  James was easy--he did Art which needed no written information!

Mariposa chose History.  She was learning about early America
this year in school. 

We read about famous people, and she summarized
the stories and retold them to me.

Bunny loves rocks!  We say she has rocks in her head.  ;o)

This summer we are taking a 3-day trip to central
OR to go rockhounding, so Bunny's info will
come in handy.

No surprise that James would present his Art.

I color-copied the backs of his bills so he could
display them on the poster board.

There were so many great displays!  My favorite displays
(besides my kids')  were presentations on Gettysburg, a science
experiment, and one on invasive species in Oregon.

This was a great experience for me and the kids (even if we did have to fight Portland traffic in rush hour…on an evening that President Obama flew in for a visit!).  The kids worked hard on their displays and they are looking forward to next year's event. I'm grateful that the kids have these experiences that mimic group school events, but that we can do together!