We participated in our homeschool group’s Cultural Fair for the first time this year! The kids picked India to research and represent… mainly because they wanted me to make Chicken Tikka Masala. It’s pretty much their favorite thing to eat and they wanted to be able to share with all their friends. 

We started with a trip to the library and teaching Logan how to look up books through the catalog on the computer and then how to find them. He was pretty proud of himself! Next, we researched other people’s cultural fair displays to help get an idea how we might set ours up. We’ve been working on teaching Logan to type, so we made him do all the work! Then we started our India research. We read through the books we got at the library, watched some Youtube videos, and a couple of documentaries, and did some Googling. I tried really hard for this to be a child led project and for my influence to be as minimal as possible. I even let them cut out their own pictures… while inside I was cringing because the lines weren’t straight, haha. 

We made an origami lotus flower.

We colored a map and a flag.

We made a model of the Taj Mahal. I had to step in and help with the cutting on this one. It was a little too difficult for the boys, but all of the kids really enjoyed helping with the painting part.

Our finished product… and of course Atti wouldn’t be in a picture, until later when I bribed him with some more Chicken Tikka and took a quick one with my phone.

And yes, Atticus is wearing his Halloween costume. We joked that most of our family represented India, and Atti represented Hyrule, the land that Link is from.

As requested, I made a boatload of Chicken Tikka Masala so we could give out little sample cups. I cheated a bit because I bought the rice from a restaurant. I can’t make rice to save my life!!!

And Atti pretty much just wanted to sit around and eat all night.

About halfway through I remembered that I had brought my computer to display some traditional dancing, clips from Bollywood movies, and a couple of my favorite Indian songs. Several of the girls in our homeschool group are really into dance. They seemed to really enjoy watching the clips!

And here are the amazing displays put on by the other families in our group:

The boys loved this project so much! They have already been asking when we can have cultural fair again! It makes this Momma’s heart so happy to see them excited about learning. <3