Helping People

To go along with our study of the Presidents (this week it is Coolidge, Hoover and FDR) we are thinking about how to help others. Hoover dove into war relief efforts and FDR did a bazillion thing for the downtrodden through his New Deal policies. Some ideas succeeded and some didn't. The point was that they cared and they did something rather sitting on their bum. This is the character trait I want to instill in my kids.

So, their project idea was to build a facility that would help people in some way. They call it the Lobby. It has a health agency, a supply cabinet, a travel agency, beds and a pool table. The downtrodden can come here to get some pretty specific needs met. We all agreed it would be great have something like this in real life where they can go and feel loved and human during the day.

J turned the project into a media presentation using his mp3 player to do narration. I wish I could post it. It had creative titles and even a dedication to FDR in the credits. Here are some other features though:

The people outside can't wait to get in. (See the guy banging on the window?)

They are orderly, however, and line up at the door.


They check out their pool cues from the front desk.

And they can lay down for a nap

after they take off their hat.

There's a bunch of really funny pictures that are too fuzzy to post. But the whole project just has J written all over it. He loves to do these things.

On top of that we thought hard about what things we can do to help the poor. So, we found some things to give to the Community Warehouse, some other things to give to another family who is starting over and we even called Dad at work to ask him to buy some things on clearance that we can simply give away. Saturday we'll spend time with friends who are leaving to help the people of Bangladesh. I love it when life and learning totally intersect. These are things we would have done ANYWAY.