Piedmont Farmers 4-H Cloverbud Club

What is 4-H? 

4‑H is delivered by Cooperative Extension—a community of more than 100 public universities across the nation that provides experiences where young people learn by doing.  The goal of 4-H is to teach youth citizenship, leadership, and life skills.  For more than 100 years, 4‑H has welcomed young people of all beliefs and backgrounds, giving kids a voice to express who they are and how they make their lives and communities better.

Purpose: 

The Piedmont Farmers 4-H Cloverbud is for youth age 5 to 8 years old who love learning about farming and animals.  Throughout the year, the club will visit working farms, participate in hands-on learning activities, and conduct service projects.  This is a great way for our families to gain a deeper appreciation of our agricultural community.  Members can also participate in presentation competitions and county-wide activities like the Fauquier Fair. 

Meetings: 

Monthly club meetings occur on the 3rd Sunday of each month at 2 PM. We will start with the 4-H and American pledges.  Generally a project or field trip will follow. Many of our meetings will be outside and will include livestock. Our locations rotate throughout Fauquier County or very near to Fauquier county.  We give a heads-up email with our location at least a week ahead of time. Email is our primary mode of communication. 

Fauquier County 4-H frequently has additional events and opportunities at other times, but meetings are strictly once a month.  We generally skip December and July in consideration of the holidays and summer travel.  We consider these meetings to be family meetings—older and younger siblings are welcome, some kids come with a parent, grandparents, aunt/uncle, family friend etc. Cloverbuds need at least one adult to attend the meeting. 

Parent (or Grandparent, Aunt, Uncle, etc.) Involvement:

4-H Club Membership is free thanks to the 100's of volunteers that offer their time to organize activities for our clubs.  Volunteers help with things like planning fieldtrips, organizing a service project, bringing snacks, or leading kids in a hands-on project.  If you are willing to volunteer your time to help out with this club, please contact Matt Martinez at lordorange@aol.com or Megan Kleinhans at sinner04@sbc.edu.  

Club Activities: 

Presentations: We work on presentations at the January and February meetings.  Cloverbuds and 4-H members prepare presentations on a topic of their choice - we have had kids give presentations on everything from donkeys to slime recipes to Minecraft.  For Cloverbuds especially, we just want them to get comfortable with public speaking and so the more excited they are about a topic the better.  

Showing: Some members of our club live on farms or have access to a farm. Members can show the animals they raise in the 4-H division at the county fair.  We will likely visit with some older 4-H'ers that will help us learn more about showing. 

Field Trips: Many farms across Fauquier County have been eager to host tours for our club over the years.  We want to maintain our good relations with the agricultural community by continuing to be good guests.  Coaching your child to be respectful, ask good questions, and say thank you to our hosts will help us coordinate future field trips.  

Membership: 

To join, youth must be registered at v2.4honline.com. If your child is not registered, they will not be able to participate in 4-H.  There is no cost to join 4-H.  Piedmont Farmer's 4-H Cloverbud Club Members must be 5 - 8 years old as of September 30, 2023.  

contact

For more information, please contact Matt Martinez at lordorange@aol.com or Megan Kleinhans at sinner04@sbc.edu .  If you are interested in joining, please send Matt or Megan a note so they can make sure to include you in communications about upcoming meetings.