Joining a co-op has been one of our best homeschool moves this year, and the kids (especially Ryan) were excited to participate in the annual geography fair. Since we’ve been learning so much about Ancient Greece, it was the focus of our simple display.

In addition to the poster, we displayed a a clay model of the Parthenon sculpted with Air Dry Modeling Clay and a butter knife. The model was heavy and a bit awkward once dried, but held up well to all the curious little passerbys’ fingers that couldn’t resist tactile-y exploring the sculpture!

Geography Fair Poster

As you can see above, our poster was pretty simple:

A few handwritten pieces about some facts we’d been learning, the famous Greek myth of the Trojan Horse (and our painted horse craft), oil pastel line drawings of the Parthenon and the Greek flag, and some photos from our field trip to the Parthenon.

I’d also planned to include a list of “books we read” on the poster, but Jared suggested it sounded a little too braggy, so we just set out a few of our favorites for people to browse–if they were interested.

Geography Fair Costumes

“Costumes” were a fun addition to the geography fair presentation. They turned out cute, and were very simple.

Simple DIY Olympic Ring T-Shirt

Ryan nixed the idea of wearing a Greek-inspired toga (“too much like a dress, mommy!”), and preferred to represent the Olympics since the first was in Greece (776 B.C.).

We made the “Olympic ring shirt” from a basic $2 white t-shirt and rings cut from colored felt–then hot glued to the front. You could sew them on for more permanence, but I literally threw this together 10 minutes before the geography fair started. Hot glue is a procrastinator’s best friend!

We happened to have a dollar store “gold metal” hanging around–given out as a goodie bag favor at a party they attended recently–and that completed his dress-up.

Simple DIY Greek Togas

The girls’ togas were also last minute costumes–each made from a piece of inexpensive white cotton fabric.

I folded the material (about a yard for each toga) in half and cut a hole big enough for their heads to slip in–similar to how you’d wear a shawl. Then I wrapped the edges of the fabric around their bodies so their arms were free and tied it around their waist with another scrap of fabric. No sewing, gluing, hemming required.

The head pieces were garland wreaths from the craft store (50% off!), bobby pinned to their hair.

To round out our table and contribute to the Geography Fair potluck, we served a simply dressed romaine lettuce-cherry tomato-black olive-red onion-feta cheese-Greek salad. Authentic? No, but are you sensing a theme here?

Simple. 

Since it was our first experience with a geography fair and I ended up being on my own juggling all four kids that night, simple was necessary. Unfortunately–simple didn’t really impress the judges (to Ryan’s disappointment). But after the initial five minutes of being too hard on myself, I was reminded there’s a season for everything.

Maybe one day there will be a season for elaborate reports, salt dough maps, Lego architectural constructions, carefully planned costumes, and first prize cash awards. But then again, maybe there won’t. And while there may be more moments of comforting disappointed kiddos, my season right now–while my kids are young and mold-able–is to  expose, encourage, and enthuse a love for learning.

And seeing my seven-year-old (unprompted) pick out library books on Ancient Greece, make family trees on the Greek gods, and study a map of Europe tells me, we’re winning.

Linked to: Trivium Tuesdays