Homeschool International Fair

Marshall and Shaylen wrapped up school in early May, but one of our last school functions was to participate in a homeschool international fair.

The kids had to get a tri-fold display and report on a specific country. After thinking a bit on what all was required of them, I decided that the kids would do Zambia since we had so many artifacts from there (thank you Auntie Janellee). We also had outfits that were made from Zambian material (thank you Auntie Janellee) and easy access to quick answers (thank you Auntie Janellee, Missionary Phil Hunt and Google).

Marshall and Shaylen were super excited to work on it and find the answers. We couldn't just report on any old thing. We had a list of specific questions we had to answer. That made things more interesting! Once those were answered and displayed on our board, we could also add other information we deemed worthy of display. (The kids were really excited to put up a picture of a dung beetle. They think his job is really, really interesting!)

Since Marshall & Shaylen have limited abilites with the computer, I would look things up and then they would help find the information and pictures. They were so cute writing things down on paper and then telling me what to type up. It was a ton of fun and they were super researchers. Obviously, by looking at the pictures, you'll know that there was a ton of help from me (how could I not help, right?), but they really did get in on a bunch of the action. The kids also had to internalize a lot of the information so that they could be familiar enough with Zambia in order to answer the questions of those that would visit their "booth."

The kids enjoyed visiting the other displays and looking at their interesting artifacts. There were displays of Afghanistan, Austria, Australia, England, France, Ireland, Italy & Norway. That equals a lot of work by our homeschool kids (and a lot of work involving their Mommies)! Reports, costumes, displays and food usually don't just appear without a mom somewhere behind the scenes.

After we were all done taking our tours and filling out our passports, we enjoyed an international meal. It was delicious! The kids and I made ndiwo and nshima. That's Zambian for stew and corn meal mush. It was really good and we liked it. I used chicken, spinach, tomatoes and onions for the stew. That was my favorite part. The kids really liked the nshima. I'm thinking it wasn't necessarily for the taste, which was quite bland, but for the mere fact that they got to eat it with their fingers. It was a successful night, mostly in part due to the planning and organization by one of our homeschool moms, Jane (Ellen's mom). It was her idea and I'm so glad she spearheaded it all. We loved it!