I come from a small town north of Saskatoon called Hepburn. My graduating class consisted of a whopping eighteen people and we were the largest class our school had had in years. Hepburn has a quaint tradition where after the graduation ceremonies each grad hosts a “tea” at their homes. Friends and family (and pretty much the entire town) randomly hop from house to house having dainties and bevies and congratulating the grad in their own home. With grad coming up it got me thinking about celebrating the milestones of any age child.

To culminate the end of the school year or beginning of summer for those who don’t’ have kids in school why not throw a little party for a few friends and family to celebrate your child’s accomplishments. You can begin by collecting some of your child’s artwork from the school year (or just from home) and any other things they’ve done that they are particularly proud of. It may have been a report they really enjoyed doing or a fun science experiment. Take the time to display them around the party area. A friend of ours posted pictures of her time at her daughter’s end of the year meeting that included many of her pieces of art. There was such an overwhelming response to her art on Facebook that her 9 year old daughter started a “shop” and is now selling prints and originals of her artwork to support missions – how cool and what a confidence booster!

Another idea is to create a slideshow of pictures to loop on your T.V. or computer of your child for guests to see. You can choose to have a mini program or to skip it if it doesn’t suit your family. Maybe you’d like to publicly acknowledge how proud you are of your kids or interview them about their year of favourite things.

It may seem like a lot of work to go through for your child who is “just” passing from grade 3 to 4 or moving up to the “Comp” but I think you’d be surprised at how much it would mean to your child and how motivating it would be to celebrate their success and their effort.