We’ve wrapped up about 10 weeks of knights, castles, vikings, Black Death, and Joan of Arc. And we’ve kicked off our year with our first fun-filled unit celebration. Our Tapestry of Grace curriculum (see my affiliate link in the side bar) recommends closing out each unit with a party, a celebration of all that the kids have learned. And while, yes, this means more work for Mommy, it also is a way for Daddy to connect with what the kids are learning and for all of us to reflect on exactly what we did accomplish over those hours and days and weeks.
What do we do?
While some families make costumes and reenact dramas, that’s just not our style. Of course, my kids would love to dress up. But I don’t sew. And if I tried to sew, they probably wouldn’t want to wear the result. So, we celebrate in other ways:
- displays,
- a trivia game with Dad,
- and a home video of all their recitations.
We set up displays of history and art projects, science, and for this celebration, latin. We’ve been using Song School Latin, and Middlest wanted to create a diorama from the vocab she’s been learning. The kids notebooks are also on display.
Next, we play a game of trivia with the facts the kids have been learning. Daddy gets to look over the questions briefly before the game (which is all he needs; he’s awesome like that). This year, I’ve made a board game for our review, and it worked so well! It took the pressure off of the questions themselves, and allowed everyone to have a good time. The score was fun, but not the ultimate factor. In fact, it was so much fun, the kids were ready to play a second round!
We enjoyed a meal of rotisserie chicken and green beans with bread, and the kids begged me to make “mead” (the unfermented version with water, orange slices, and honey). It was an authentic as we wanted to get. Oh, and the kids did decide to eat with their fingers, in true medieval style.
We finished the night off with a home video I put together of the kids reciting their timeline (Creation to Joan of Arc, woo-hoo!) and some catechism songs we’ve been working on. This was so much fun, especially because I let my kids be themselves in the videos with only a few interventions. My only requirement was that they be clear and understandable. So my hams really hammed it up. We laughed and laughed together.
It really was a celebration. And in spite of the extra work, it was well worth it to see what it is that we really do get done in a day’s work.
