Cloverleaf 4-H Club

The Fayette County 4-H Cloverleaf program is conducted in the grade schools across Fayette County. Each year we work with the schools to orchestrate a cooperative education program that ties directly in to the schools programming and it also complements and enhances the curriculum in school settings. 4-H lessons and curriculum for elementary and middle school are designed to compliment, enhance and meet Georgia Performance Standards.

Fayette County’s Cloverleaf 4-H program also gives the youth the opportunity to participate in 4-H Project Achievement. Project achievement is a wonderful tool for enhancing the subject area of language arts. This teaching tool encourages and fosters the development of both oral and written communication skills.
The key components of the project achievement teaching tool are research, organization, summary, and expression. This teaching tool is a process which begins with curiosity about a subject. Once the student has explored many various subject areas and selects a topic to research, true knowledge gain begins. The student gathers materials based on his or her subject area and reads to gain understanding of the subject matter/area he or she has chosen. This material is absorbed and summarized by the student and organization of the ideas begins. This part of the learning process allows exposure to new vocabulary and reinforces reading comprehension skills.

Once knowledge and information is collected on the chosen subject the student is required to organize the information and generate a speech (usually in the form of a composition) on the subject matter. The organizing and outlining process allows the student to use the creative writing method in the development of text generation. Creative writing method includes the following steps: brainstorming about the subject, synthesizing the material into a jot list or graphic organizer, outlining the material so that key points can be communicated to the audience, and generating text to evolve into a speech that is informative and easily communicates and educates the audience on valuable information about the subject area.

In generating a speech for the public speaking component of the learning experience (Project Achievement), the student focuses on becoming familiar enough with the written text that he or she is able to share the information orally with others. The opportunity to speak publicly about the information researched and text generated provides a great opportunity to practice and solidify oral communication skills.

Project Achievement fosters the development of oral communication skills by encouraging the student to recall, interpret and summarize information researched. Project achievement also provides the opportunity to deliver a planned oral presentation and provides a “real world experience” in adjusting the manner and style of speaking to the audience and situation. All of these are key components of the Georgia Performance Standards. This method known as Project Achievement is in keeping with the Experiential Learning philosophy which allows a student to experience the act of research, share the information gained in the form of visuals and a speech, process what is important about the subject matter in the form of visuals and key phrases in the speech, and generalize and apply the material to their individual life.

Not every school in the ocunty participates. The participation is determined by each school.

Cloverleaf 4-H is also extended to private schools and our Fayette County Homer Schoolers.

If you would like your school or class involved, contact the Extension Office and we can help.