Last fall, I started teaching a few classes at the local community college’s continuing education program.  I’m having a blast.  It started with a few canning classes, I just finished teaching a frugality class, and I have a worm composting class in a few weeks.  I found out yesterday that students have been waitlisted for the worm composting class and I’m working with the college to add another class this semester.  I truly believe the classes have been as beneficial for me as they have been for the students.  I feel like the classes go well and all of my evaluations have been in the good to excellent range so I’m confident the students agree.

Every continuing education class I teach, I begin by asking the students to give a brief introduction with their reasons for taking the class and any experience they may have with the particular subject.  It’s proven helpful in both the canning and frugality classes because it allowed me to customized the classes a bit more for the students in attendance.  It was especially helpful in the frugality class because they were for the most part a very frugal bunch seeking new ideas and maybe a little validation.  That was not at all whom I had envisioned taking the class and because of that my lesson plans for the class were not at all on target.  I’m grateful for all those high school speech and debate classes and events I participated in, because I am able to think fast on my feet and boy did I have to do that with this group.

Willow asked me if I’d share the syllabus to the frugality class.  In general this is what we did, because of the group it was very different than if the students had been those with lots of debt, etc. which was what I was expecting.  The first week, we discussed frugality as means towards enjoying life and gaining more freedom.  We discussed at length many ways to be frugal without feeling terribly deprived.  The students were very active and it was very much discussion not lecture.  The students were given expense worksheets and asked to track their spending for the next week and bring those sheets back the next week.  The second week we talked about the expense worksheets and the students were asked to classify each expense into three categories: Need, Impulse, Want and to figure the hours of work needed to pay for those items.  We discussed wants not being bad, but the methods to avoid impulses and how in lean times the expense worksheets will really help us cut back on unnecessary things.  We discussed planning at length that night - I’m a firm believer in that good planning is key to frugal success.  The last night I gave the class my favorite frugal tips and we talked about paying for convenience versus enjoyment.  They were given handouts each week and a list of my favorite frugality resources that included books and websites.

I’ve proposed a few more classes along this line to the college for the summer semester and hope to do the canning class again in the fall.  The whole idea behind these classes started when a number of students taking the organic gardening class last year, found out about me and my worm composting.  I helped many of them out and the light bulb went off that I should offer the formal class and look at me now.  What a great opportunity and blessing this has been!