Four Rules Everyone Must Follow
I quickly learned, after inviting guests to tour my homestead, I needed to set up some easy “rules” for everyone, no matter their age. I wanted the experience of visiting my homestead to be a pleasant one for everyone, including my animals and me! It was up to me to set the expectations for my guests. To be unclear is to be unkind and I most definitely wanted to be kind.
During my introductory chat with those taking a homestead tour, I mentioned how each animal served a purpose. Most were our food source for my family. If something were to happen to a particular animal, it meant I wouldn’t have, say beef or pork, for a whole year. I wanted to explain my “why” before I rolled out the rules.
I had three rules – easy enough for even my preschoolers to remember.
1. Do not put your hand in ANY fence.
I’d do a demonstration of what could happen if they tried to pet a cow and the cow stood up, smashing their hand against the fence.
2.Do not put your hand in any animals mouth.
Why? Yes, because they could bite you.
3.Do not chase any animal on the farm.
Usually I did homestead tours in the spring when we had a bunch of baby animals. Kids LOVE to chase them to try and pick them up or touch them.
I had the children and adults repeat the 3 rules back to me and I put hand motions with each rule. Better retention when there is a physical action correlating with what you want them to remember. I emphasized to the teachers and parents, if a child or children could not obey these 3 rules, they would be sent back to the car or bus for the remainder of the time. I was not joking and they knew it.
During one Pre-school introductory chat, I went over all the rules and made sure the kids knew them. One little girl raised her hand.
“Yes?”
“and Rule number 4 – Have Fun! Right??”
She was absolutely right and I told her so. I reiterated the 4th rule and had all the kids go over all 4 rules with me, emphasizing the last one – Have Fun!!!!!