Hi friends!
First I want to start by saying thank for being here to read this post! I’m so honored that you are considering using any of my curriculum for your co-op or classroom. I am so happy to help spread the love of learning with these fun hands on studies!
I run a small co-op in our area and this past year we used Me and My Place in Space and Me and My Amazing Body. *Lots of info on how our co-op started, how to start your own, or where to find one in THIS post.
Our co-op meets every other week and both of these units are 10 weeks long, so it worked out great to use one guide in the fall and one in the spring. We have about 25 kids in our group, all ages 3-10, and these guides worked great for everyone.
Today I’m going to share with you how I used these guides in a co-op setting and the different ways you can use my history guides as well.
If your group has 10 students or less, you are free to use any of my curriculum as is. The copyright allows you to print multiple copies of the art templates, maps, worksheets, or booklists for each member of your group. You may not disburse the entirety of the curriculum to each family or member.
If you have more than 10 students you can purchase a small or large group license. This allows you to print multiple copies for many more students and is a great deal! (Making it only around $8 per student!)
Small Group License (+20 students)
Large Group License (+30 students)
If your group would each like to purchase their own guide in its entirety, please send me an email and I can give you a special discount code for your group to use!
*The curriculum or guides you plan to use are purchased separately from any group license.
Me on the Map, Me and My Place in Space, Me and My Amazing Body
These science and social studies guides are SO much fun and pretty simple to use in a group/co-op setting!
How often your group meets will definitely determine the way I would break up the lessons. Our small group meets up once every other week and would complete one lesson/unit. I’ll share below an example of how I broke down each guide and what we did for each lesson with this schedule. If you meet up once every week, you could break up one lesson over the course of 2 weeks. (Example: for Me and My Place in Space you can complete one planet each week rather than the 2 per lesson.)
For each week we met up, we would complete one unit. I would read from the encyclopedia pages listed, do any demonstrations (prepped ahead of time), and we would all complete the art project together for their solar system facts book. We also meet up at a local park, so couldn’t do certain things like making recipes or watching videos. At home, everyone could choose to continue learning by reading more picture books or watch any recommended videos. Also don’t feel like you have to do everything! These guides are meant to give you multiple options of activities to pick and choose from.
Every week we have a different family sign up to bring snacks. They could choose to bring any snack ideas/recipes suggested in the curriculum or anything else (it didn’t have to be themed.) Many times some moms would just bring donuts and that is always welcomed with kids!
Me and My Place in Space probably has the most prep for a co-op since there are 2 different planets (lots of circles to cut out) and art projects each lesson. I also provided everyone with black paper and the space “fact strips” for their solar system facts book, but they finished completing these at home.
*TIP: Look ahead for the following week lesson so you can start collecting multiple of any items you’ll need like bottle cap tops, empty liter bottles, fruit cups, etc.
*TIP: If you are teaching the kids using these guides, pre-read the pages listed in the guide or watch some of the videos the day or night before. They always have LOTS of questions and then I am able to answer at least a few. Haha!
Examples of a few lessons with our co-op:
Unit 1: Astronauts & Rockets
For this lesson I read to them our introduction to space, all about astronauts, and rockets from the suggested encyclopedia.
The kids colored & made their astronaut craft: I had each family text or email a picture of their child ahead of time. I printed them on regular printer paper & cut them out. I bought packs of fruit cups and dumped them all into a bowl (that we ate at home throughout the week) and pre-cut everything so they were easy to assemble. I have a cordless hot glue gun that came in handy, but you can use white glue too.
They also colored the cover page for their solar systems fact book.
The mom on snack duty used the recipe in my guide for the fruit rockets. She pre-cut all the fruit and put all the pieces into zip-lock bags so we could easily pass them out for the kids to assemble and then eat.
Then they play! Playing after our lesson allows lots of time for any projects to dry.
Unit 5: Mercury & Venus
For this lesson I read the kids the suggested encyclopedia pages about Mercury and Venus.
I brought everything ready to do the crater experiment, letting a few of the kids take turns trying it, and the melted rock & lava demonstration (I brought hot melted butter in a thermos. Preheat the thermos with hot water and melt the butter right before you leave.)
Then we completed the art projects for both planets Mercury & Venus. (I pre-cut all the circles out of card-stock for each planet.) I would tell the kids the instructions for both projects and then split them up so half the group would do one project and half would do the other, then they would switch when they were done. *For some planet projects like Venus, I would have 2 trays of the paint mixture and they would take turns dipping in their circle.
Then we had a snack provided by one family and they would play! At the end of each meeting, they would take home their planets or projects and could add them to their solar system facts book at home.
We completed this study this spring and it was so fun with our group! On the first day we completed the first unit, an introduction to the human body. Instead of the large body portraits, I grabbed some pre-cut blank bodies from the Dollar Store (in the school section) and everyone drew/colored themselves. We played label the body parts working in pairs and I took a photo of everyone to use for their flip body book.
The flip body took the most time to prep, cutting out everyone’s photo and one page for every unit. I put them fully together in the beginning so I could bring them to each meeting the rest of the semester and we could color the layer for each lesson. It was a lot of work up front, but almost no prep the rest of the semester which was really nice.
Examples of a few lessons:
Unit 7: My Heart
For this lesson, I started by reading the encyclopedia pages to the kids listed in the guide. I pre-made the pumping heart to demonstrate to them how a heart pumps blood. I also pre-made the DIY stethoscope they could take turns using on each other.
Then we did the “Beat the Heart Race” activity. I had 2 sets of buckets so we could race 2 kids at a time.
After that, we turned their body flip book to the next blank page, and drew/colored their heart. Then we had snack brought by one family and played!
Unit 8: My Lungs
For this lesson, I began by reading the encyclopedia pages and always answering lots of questions. I pre-made the paper bag lungs to demonstrate to them how our lungs expand and inflate.
Then we completed the “lung art surprise.” I printed and prepped each page the night before using the baking soda and water. The next day at the meeting, I had small paper bowls of the hand sanitizer & turmeric so they could just paint the lungs and see them magically appear. They loved this one!
After that, we turned our flip book to the next blank body and drew their lungs. Snacks and then playing!
To see more ideas when we used it with our co-op, check out my highlight HERE on Instagram!
We haven’t used Me on the Map with our co-op yet, but if we did, this is how I would do each lesson:
I would read the corresponding pages from Me on the Map and maybe pick one favorite picture book from the booklist to read aloud. I would pick one or two activities to do together, depending on how simple they are, then complete the circle for that section (maybe pre-printing any small pictures they could glue on their circle for their city, state, etc.)
The following meet up, we would do the next unit- read aloud, activity or two, complete the next circle.
This guide also has lots of great opportunities for field trips when you are learning about your city and state!
If you are using my American History units (American Girl History, Adventures to the New World, or Adventures Through America) it might be easiest to complete them by meeting more often, like once per week, because there is more to cover.
When you get together, you can do the readings together and choose an activity or notebook page to complete.
Another option would be to have everyone complete the readings at home in their own time, as well as their notebook pages. When you get together, you can present or show each other their notebook pages, talk about what you learned, and complete any of the activities or art projects.
You can also break the readings up by assigning different ones to each student/family. They can read about that section and then present/teach it to the rest of the group when you meet next. You can prepare ahead any of the recipes, feasts, or tea parties to enjoy together. You can also break kids up into teams or groups to create the large map projects and play any of the games.
Feel free to stretch the curriculum to make it work for you! You can cover one unit or time period over the course of a few months, rather than one, and don’t feel like you need to complete every activity.
Cost
Since I prepare and prep a lot of the activities or projects for our co-op, I do have everyone chip in for supplies. Each guide comes with a supply list, so I roughly get an idea of the projects we will be doing and write down the cost of the supplies we will need. I figure out a total of what the supplies would cost for the number of students in our group and divide it among each student. Many of the demonstrations use simple household items that I already have on hand, so I didn’t charge for those. For Me and My Place in Space I mostly needed to purchase a lot of paper (black paper for their solar system fact books, and white card stock for all their planet art.) For that semester it was $15 per student for supplies. Add in the cost of the group license and it would only be around $25 per student.
Me and My Amazing Body didn’t have a lot of prep & supplies, so it was only $10 per student. Add in the cost of the group license rounded up and it makes it to only $20 per student.
**Your price or cost for supplies may be completely different than mine. I would just come up with a total and divide it evenly among your group.
I hope this post has been helpful or given you some ideas on being able to use our curriculum for your group or co-op. (Sorry it got a bit lengthy!) If you ever have more questions or need help figuring out how to do certain things with your group, please feel free to send me an email! I would love to help!
I also hope my guides bring so much joy and memorable learning to all of your students! I wish you all the success if you are the one using them to teach too!
– Lindsay
✨Reminder! All of these unit studies and curriculum are on SALE until June 3rd, 2024. Use code SUMMER20 for 20% off!
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