Passport to the World

As I mentioned in my posts about How to Make a Summer Learning & Fun Plan (go here to find Part One and here for Part Two!), this summer the kids and I are going to explore geography by learning about a new country that the kids chose each week this summer.  I loved this idea, and I thought I would share how I planned and set it up so that you (my wonderful readers!) could maybe steal a few ideas and institute it yourselves.

First thing I did was hand the kids a world map and asked them to pick out eleven countries that they would like to learn more about (We have 11 weeks of summer ahead).  Then I found this adorable free printable passport page online and printed the covers on card stock. I printed the inside informational page on regular paper, and after cutting them out, I used them as templates to cut out some passport pages.  After cutting all the pages out, I folded them all into a little booklet and stapled it together.

The passport covers were printed on card stock, also used these as a template for inside pages.

The inside front page was also a free printable, printed on regular paper.

 I then labeled the inside pages with the name of each country we will be learning about, and left a few pages blank in the back for notes.  I love how they turned out, and seeing them has got the children excited to fill their passports up!

Each week we will do a daily activity that explores something about each country that my children picked.  For their passport 'stamps' I printed two of each country's flags out on sticker paper.  Each week they'll put the country's flag on it's appropriate page and then add something to show what they learned regarding that weeks country.  I'm leaving this open to the children, they can choose to include notes, pictures, statistics, or just a summary of the favorite activity from the week.

The flags of the countries we will be studying.

Each day we will do one activity for the country of the week, leaving time for further exploration if the children wish.  The activities aren't going to be just contemporary...many of the countries have rich histories that are so fun to discover!  I'm also going to make every effort to include a cultural food that we make together each week (Italy=Pizza!!), but most of the activities will be art and research focused.  I found a bunch of simple activities online that are cheap, easy, and look like a lot of fun!

We will probably be doing these activities in the afternoons, after Curls is done with his nap, which means that the neighbor children will probably often join us!  I'm excited and hopeful that this opens up a little bit of cultural appreciation and understanding with my children!