March 17, 2017
It has been a very busy week here. I am sending lessons for to the designer, and recording podcasts for Wild and Free bundles, so my homeschool creativity zone is not getting all the attention that I would wish.
I knew St Patrick's Day was coming and made sure to buy a corned beef for our yearly corned beef and cabbage meal, but totally forgot to rent any seasonal books from the library.
In a monk's cell at Sauls Church, the first church in Ireland.
Even though I hadn't done a fabulous job of planning ahead, we had been in Ireland while traveling this last December, and had crawled into an actual monk's cell that St Patrick might have prayed in, and visited the first church that he ministered at. My kids had a pretty good grasp on who the holiday was about. I just wanted a few activities that we could do to refresh their memory.
After I asked them what they remembered about St. Patrick (which was surprisingly extensive considering it had been a year since we'd done any formal study) we watched a few YouTube videos about the saint.
Next, I sent my children out to collect a shamrock bouquet, while I threw the corned beef and potatoes in the crock pot. Once they came back with some clover, we painted a watercolor version, and labeled it with a short narration.
We love celebrating holidays here, and as often as possible we make our learning fun and engaging by involving projects. Sometimes the projects are simple, such as the shamrock painting, and other times they are more involved, but projects are a great way to connect with your children, and develop many skills.
Update! This year (2018) we have a new resource for celebrating St. Patrick's Day, along with four other saints of the early church. It is an excerpt of The Precious People curriculum, which will be available summer 2018. You can get the Saints Cards here.
To purchase the Curriculum, Picture Word Cards, or even grab some of our freebies, click here.
For a complete list of picture books used for The Peaceful Preschool, click here.