How to host a geography fair

This month for Poppin’s Book Nook the theme is around the world.  I struggled a bit to think of a good idea because we’ve done a lot of geography posts, and used all of my favorite books, then we went to a geography fair, and I thought “SCORE!”

For those who are curious, my two favorites I’ve already done:

How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World

Me on the Map (this is a series of them)

First a word of advice to parents about the geography fair, do not make this into your project that your kids were somewhat involved in.  I saw a few displays and presentations that felt more like the parent’s work than the child’s.  You hurt your child’s education when you do this, and you enable them to think others will do their job.

Next, some general advice on set up of the geography fair:

• Set a time limit, and use a loud buzzer for station rotation.
• Have requirements for everyone to do (see my suggestions below).
• Set a max budget so no one feels bad because one person could spend $100 and another could only spend $5.  Also this makes the presentations more uniform.
• Have a passport (see more information on that below).

1.  Pick a way to display the information for the geography fair.

The easiest way is to use a Trifold Presentation Board {affiliate link} and put your information on that.    You can glue it down in many different ways to look good.  As a kid growing up we always used the Lauri Toys Alphabet Puzzle Boards, my Mom kept them and we’d use the puzzle as a stencil then color it in, much cheaper than buying stick on letters (not as pretty looking in many cases, but still good).

Alternate methods we saw (but wasn’t able to get a picture of)

• multiple pieces of poster board hung on the walls
• many different props (from people visiting, or similar items they had)
• costumes

2.  Have a simple craft for everyone to do at the geography fair.

This geography fair required each country to have a small craft for the participants to do.  Most of the countries created a flag for their craft, but some had more unique ideas.  Look at local artwork, examples of dress, animals, or plants you might find.

We made fans, masks, Faberge eggs, a toy head-dress, wrote in Hebrew, and many many flags.  My kids loved all of the crafts they got to do, and I’ve seen them played with off and on all week long.

3.  Have food to try from your country for the geography fair.

At each place we “visited” we got to try some local food.  Sometimes it was candy bought in the store, others it was cookies or bread, but it was always something easy to eat and relatively easy to make.  If you’re looking for ideas try checking out my Around the World in 12 Dishes series.  I’ve been going for 2 years and there are dozens of recipe ideas from full meals to quick snacks.

4.  Have a short presentation for the geography fair.

(Since that’s not my child, nor the child of a good friend I’ve put her in a disguise)

At each stop in our world tour the kids in charge gave a short presentation to teach us about the country.  They told us about their language, culture, government, and whatever struck their fancy.  Each of these presentations was about 5 minutes long.

Here’s some ideas to help you with presentations:

How to write a research paper and present it (including a rubric for grading)

Creating country reports

5.  Have a passport for the kids at the geography fair

At ours they were a cute small book about the size of a real passport, and the kids put  a sticker of each country into their passport, and any notes they took.  You could make them a little bigger, and this could be where they put their crafts, and maybe glue in extra information.  No matter what I think this is a great idea for all geography fairs to have.

And for those who are wondering what happened to Science Sunday yesterday, I got behind on…. well everything.  My lesson plans, sewing projects, blogging, and I had to let something go, and blogging was it.  So I didn’t write for yesterday.  Look for it next week as I spotlight all your cool posts for the month.

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Check out some more Poppins Book Nook ideas on Pinterest.

Clip art by Melon Headz

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