Several years ago, it became apparent to me that children need to feel a sense of accomplishment, just like adults do. They need to know that there is a purpose to what they are doing and that when one thing is accomplished, they have achieved something worth celebrating.
As a Charlotte Mason educator, I started out homeschooling without grades and even homeschooling year round. Please understand that I'm not saying that these things are wrong, because that is not what I'm saying, but rather have a starting and ending time for each grade, or year of study, so you can celebrate your child's promotion to the next grade.
Here are 5 Ways to Celebrate Your Child's Promotion to the Next Grade:
- Certificate – Create a certificate that your child can proudly display on the refrigerator, hang up in his room or put in her scrapbook. You can just make it simple and say ‘your child's name' has successfully finish ____________ and has promoted to the ‘next grade'.
- Ceremony – If you wanted to make it more special for your child, consider having some family members over to do more of a ceremony, with a cake to follow. Giving them a certificate in this setting can really be special for them.
- Yearbook – I created a special photo book for my son and he loved it! I added all the field trips that he had been on, but it would be wonderful to include some of his best work from the year, like: narration, copywork, art work, map work and more.
- Show and Tell – This is one thing that I started a few years back and has been a great thing for my children. A few other homeschooling friends and our family get together for a ‘Show and Tell' at the end of the year. This allows the children to show and tell what they have done for the year and get the ‘well done' comments that are important to them and has proven to give them the desire to do their best, knowing they will be showing it at the end of the year.
- Family Vacation or Outing – Since most families have more than one child, consider doing something to celebrate their promotion to the next grade that focuses on the family unit with a family vacation or outing that you normally won't be able to do. This would be a great motivation for your children to work diligently through the year to ensure they had the ability to celebrate together in a way that special to their promotion.
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