Hands-On Projects are the Most Remembered

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What are some of your fondest memories from school? Whether you attended public or private school or were homeschooled, you might remember the hands-on activities and projects you did the most.

I attended public school. In addition to remembering an awesome end-of-the-school-year picnic at my 4th grade teacher's farm (this event is probably similar to the field days of today's public schools), I remember all the hands-on projects we did—both in class and at home.

Some of my projects that I remember include a Native American longhouse, an animal cell made of edible materials, and a family educational tree that I made in college. For a long time, my mom kept the projects I made in elementary school. It wasn't until I was in high school that I decided to part with them to make room for other projects.

When I taught high school history, I included at least one hands-on project a year for my students. We usually started the project in the classroom with several days devoted to working on it and they completed the work at home. After teaching for several years, I had more than one student come back to tell me that they really liked building their pyramid, sphinx, Colosseum, or museum exhibit.

Homeschooling means we can complete lots of hands-on projects to solidify the information and learning for our kids. But sometimes coming up with the project, gathering all the necessary materials, and completing the project can be daunting and time-consuming. What if there was a place where you could get almost everything in one box so you would only have to worry about the actual learning and creating in relation to the project?

Hands-on History Project Kits 

Sonlight Homeschool Curriculum offers two History Project Kits for families who wish to bring history alive for their children. Whether you homeschool or not, you can use these kits to help create lasting memories of fun activities with your children.

There are two kits to choose from:

• World Cultures History Project Kit 
• World History Project Kit 

Each one offers different activities with project supplies, an instruction manual, and a schedule to help you tie it into the Sonlight curriculum programs but it can be used independently as we are using the kit. 

So you could pick a kit based upon the projects or suggested age range. World Cultures is suggested for ages 5-7 and World History is suggested for ages 6-8.

What do you get in the World Cultures History Project Kit? 

There are a total of 9 projects we will be able to complete from the hands-on history kit that will help bring various time periods of history to life for our homeschooling children. Using the 117-page instruction booklet, we will be able to gather any additional supplies we need (such as baking soda and vinegar for the volcano) and talk about history or nature of the hands-on project. The booklet is also laid out with detailed and illustrated step-by-step instructions. I love this! The layout makes it so much easier to guide our children—which can be difficult when the entire family gets involved in homeschooling.

The World Cultures History Project Kit is geared towards ages 5-7 which makes it perfect for our younger son. This also means that our older son, a teenager, can help either his brother or his younger sister complete one or more of the hands-on projects.

Getting the Whole Family Involved 

These hands-on history projects from Sonlight also allow dad to get involved in our homeschooling endeavors. So not only will our children have great memories of learning about obelisks of Ancient Egypt, volcanoes, desserts, and more, these educational memories will include our whole family learning together.

While our two younger children love homeschooling with me, they absolutely love when my husband gets involved. They love to share what they have learned as well as learn from him. For our daughter, creating the volcano with her dad, will be a memory she will share with family and friends for a long time.

Our younger children also like to show off to their dad their knowledge. Working on hands-on history projects helps them do this in an educational way. Our younger son can share what he has already learned about Egypt when putting together the obelisk (and since their Grandmom also loves studying Egyptian history, she can get involved with this project, too!).

Making Memories 

When our children have completed all the hands-on activities from the World Cultures History Project Kit, they will have made some wonderful memories. The kit will enable them to build confidence that they can create projects either on their own or with guidance from an older sibling or parent. They will also be able to share lots of knowledge that they will remember for a lifetime.

Interested in winning your own hands-on history kit from Sonlight?

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