United States Project

As part of our homeschool curriculum this year I have decided to teach Alivia and Weston the 50 states and capitols, where they are on a map, and all of the U.S. presidents.  I recently found this fun idea that we are calling our "States Project" and we finished it up today.  

I typed out a letter to send to each of the 50 governors asking for information about their state.  The kids took turns running upstairs to get the letters as they came out of the printer.  Then we had an assembly line going as I signed my name on one letter, passed it to Alivia to sign her name, and then she passed it to her brother for his name.  We did a few each day for about a week because writing your name 50 times is hard work for a five year old and especially for a four year old, but they persevered. :) And their handwriting improved!

  
Next, the kids put stamps on the envelopes while I wrote the addresses on each of them.  Thank goodness for sticky stamps these days!  When I was a kid you had to lick each one!  I think this was their favorite part.

We then took them to the mailbox a few at a time.  Livi opened the mailbox, they each put their stack in, and Weston put the flag up.

The kids and I have worked hard to get these in the mail.  We are hoping to receive packages including maps, brochures, worksheets, coloring pages, magazines, or anything else the governor's office of each state sends us.  My kids really enjoy sending and receiving mail and I thought this would be a great project to keep them interested in learning about the states.  I'll update as we receive our goodies!



I also found this great coloring page of America for the kids to color.

Alivia is my little artist and really enjoys coloring with her oil pastels.

We have a Melissa and Doug United States sound puzzle that says the capitols when you put the state puzzle piece in place.  I haven't found a song I like yet to help us memorize the states and capitols, but I thought this one was cute for the presidents.  Alivia has been numbering and writing the presidents names on a piece of paper as copywork practice from a placemat we have.

We can't wait to start receiving mail and learning about each state!