Planning and Gearing Up

Way back in July I came downstairs from settling the younger two boys in bed, and found Eldest on the kitchen floor, surrounded by felt pens and crouched over a 6-page calendar that he was making (to the end of 2013), copying dates off our kitchen calendar.  He looked up at me and asked "When does the summer holiday finish?"  I was tempted to get all deep and philosophical, waxing lyrical about our entire lives being a holiday, not needing to put a "Start-of-Term" date in writing, but I knew that he - like his Mum - really appreciates planning ahead, as long as it's not too rigid... and it was his calendar, his idea after all!  So after a few minutes dithering I finally suggested the first week of September, with the option to review when we got there.  And onto his calendar it went.

Well, here we are (or will be on Monday).  And the timing is pretty perfect.  The boys and I are all gearing up, feeling ready to get back into the flow.  They've chosen their subjects for their next lapbooks (Eldest: food chains; Middle: dinosaurs; Youngest: sharks), and I've drawn up a little plan, with their help.  I love planning, and spent most of our first year of Home Ed fighting my natural desire to order and construct mini-curricula etc, out of a well-meaning but slightly misguided desire to give my boys all the 'freedom' they needed.  Then I found the blog posts mentioned in This is our Home Ed Style, and felt freed myself to incorporate a little structure.

So here is our plan...

You'll notice it's very sparse: just two or three ideas per day, which allows lots of space for the boys to follow more of their own interests for the rest of the day.  It is not a timetable as there are no times when things have to be done (other than the clubs) - it just helps us to have a broad outline to get us focused each day.  If the boys (or I) have an idea that they want to try in the near future, they can write it on a post-it and stick it to the planner, then we will make it happen at the next opportunity!  The subjects with smileys are the only parent-required ones (everything else is optional but stuff I know the boys like doing) - and I thought that seeing as they are "work", they can carry a little reward.  For a long time the boys have wanted some kind of box of goodies to swap their 'merits' for, like they had in school, and although I resisted, seeing it as a form of bribery that I believe has no place in fostering a love of learning, we have compromised on just the bare minimum.  So for every smiley subject that is completed, the boys get to stick a smiley sticker onto their colour-coded post-it (top of planner), and at the end of the week they can swap their smileys for some sweets/ wii-time/ whatever they choose to have in the smiley box.  I'm not 100% happy with it still, but we'll give it a go and see.

So there we have it: our sort-of-plan for the term.  We're all enthusiastic and ready to go... I'll let you know how we get on!

PS If anyone's interested, for our planner we used one of those magic whiteboard sheets that adheres to a surface by way of static - no adhesive needed... love it!

PPS To clarify, for anyone who really wants to know, on Tuesday afternoons a friend and I swap some of our children so she can take her son and Eldest to Science club, while I have her youngest here with my other two for fun with Science.  Oh, and Nature club is on alternating Wednesdays, so on the other ones we visit friends!

Compared to School...

I wasn't going to write this post (am trying to write another), but was prodded into it by two other blog posts posted on Facebook today, by two very lovely ladies.

The first was this one from the archives of Ross Mountney, encouraging just-starting home educators (but also encouraging to anyone HE'ing and needing reassurance).  It highlighted a train of thought I had earlier today about Home Ed compared to school.  I wasn't wobbling, just thinking about all the lessons they cram in to every day compared to the little we have on the planner (for said planner see my next post, coming soon...).  I get the need for Maths & English: they are vital skills - but history?  to a six year old?  (Sorry history lovers, it's just an example based on where the train of thought went next...)  I remember a history lesson from lower primary school about Vikings.  I remember it because I copied the picture that my neighbour had drawn and was subsequently told off.  I do not however remember a single fact that I was "taught" in that lesson.  And it just reassured me that there is no point comparing what we do with schools, because so much of the 'force-fed' education in school will simply be forgotten by those who weren't interested.  As a teacher I was always trying to find new ways to engage my students, to make lessons interesting etc, but had to accept that there was no way of guaranteeing that every student would remember everything I taught. Still, I persisted, and hopefully some of it will have gone in.  Now though, I am so relieved not to have to do all that stressful planning (sorry teacher-friends if that sounds smug)... I find fun ideas, and put them in front of the boys to pick up if they're inspired - but at least equally as often, they find their own fun ideas, and if I can't help, we learn together.  My kids may seem to spend less time learning (or in structured learning at least), but they will remember more of what they learn, because they want to know it... that's the plan anyway!

This train of thought then had me thinking about the 'gaps', or subjects that we don't cover, not having a prescribed programme of study such as the National Curriculum - but before I had chance for it to develop into even a hint of a wobble, I saw this post about Homeschool gaps, shared by a good friend.  The point that the author rightly makes, is that in raising enthusiastic, self-directed learners, we are empowering them so that when they reach an area that they don't know about but need or want to, they will simply find out for themselves.  And of course, there will be gaps in any education, no matter how comprehensive the curriculum.  A history-loving HE friend (read her blog post here) was recently bemoaning the difficulty of studying subjects like the Bronze Age at home, because its exclusion from the National Curriculum means that resources on the subject are not perceived as in demand enough to be stocked in shops.  Et voila: a gap in the education of every state-schooled child.   Quite simply, no education is ever going to cover every single thing that your child is ever going to want or need to know - but home educators are privileged to be able to cater for the interests of the individual in a way that school education would never be able to do, and for that I am enormously grateful!

Focusing on the right thing

I've been feeling a bit flat lately.  Not in the run-over-by-a-steamroller way - although I have had my moments - but just less sparkly or enthusiastic than usual.  If course, there are some very good reasons for this as regular readers will know - it's understandable & I'm not beating myself up over it - just noting it.  My reason for sharing it here is that I think while all home educators have seasons of real energy and vision (by nature we have to be visionaries, to go against the flow of mainstream education), at times we also have seasons of less energy; maybe less confidence or direction.  And that is OK.  It's natural - in fact, I think it's healthy.  I was sharing with a friend recently the seasonal nature of a child's learning: periods of intense obvious growth and enthusiasm, followed by periods of quiet reflection when there appears to be no interest in anything much - but after which season, when learning becomes more active again it becomes apparent that great strides have been made in their understanding while they were resting.  Well, as with children, so with us adults: I think it's healthy to recognise the seasons in our own motivation and energy, and to run with the strengths of each season - whether the energy & drive of the high-vision moments, or the consolidating strength of the resting periods.

So that being said, I've been focusing on the strengths of where we're at.  I could give in to my slightly dissatisfied feelings of 'not doing enough'/ 'are they learning anything'... the usual wobbles - or I could acknowledge how much is actually going on.  If I was feeling negative I would say 'they just watched TV this morning'.  In actual fact, they were watching "Artzooka" (an excellent art & craft programme that really inspires their own creativity) and "Finding Stuff Out" (this morning's episode learning about the sun, solar power, solar system etc) - and "Octonauts" which helped Youngest to learn about the Mariana Trench (deepest part of the ocean).  I could be discouraged that it's taken Middle a couple of months to finish his latest lapbook - or I could rejoice that his interest in the chosen subject (volcanoes) has continued for that long, despite not having the desire/ opportunity to work on his project book... and indeed rejoice that he completed his lapbook today, still as eager to share what he knows as he was at the beginning!  (*lapbook photos to follow soon hopefully - I ran out of time this evening*)  I am occasionally tempted to worry if I am "forcing" the boys to do their online curricula, and thereby ruining their natural love of learning, despite knowing that they chose MathsWhizz and Reading Eggs themselves - but today I am just so encouraged that Eldest has finally managed to conquer an area in maths that he had come up against a few times and was finding a challenge.  He hadn't complained about it (apart from the first time when he hit the issue and needed me to reassure him that "failing" wasn't a problem: as long as he kept practicing he would get there in the end) - and today, his look of accomplishment was a joy to behold!   And I could, if I was feeling really low (I'm not actually this bad), feel guilty about the amount of time that we're spending outside, and not "doing lessons" - not that we do lessons anyway, but you know what I mean - but actually it's been such a long, cold and hard winter/ spring, we are just rejoicing in the opportunity to top up our vitamin D, to go for long rambles, interacting with nature, often while socialising with friends, before it gets cold and wet again, and we retreat to our cosy home.

Anyway, you get the point: I'm learning with my children that everything about Home Ed is seasonal and there are different strengths and weaknesses to each season.  Oh, and finally, speaking of seasons, I couldn't go without sharing Eldest's latest photos from his camera trap (inspired by the very seasonal Springwatch).  We got some more lovely photos, this time from pointing the camera towards the woodland behind our garden... we were very excited to see the results, and hope you enjoy them too...

 hooray, it's a fox!

 

Foxy's spotted something...

 

whatever it is, he's not happy about it... 

and the biggest squeals of excitement saved for...

the badger (or its bum, at any rate)

A Little Wobble

I don't ever seem to get major wobbles - you know, the sort that make you seriously consider if your child(ren) would be better off in school.  Because mine have already done the school thing I am completely confident that they are better off with me (for reasons that regular blog-readers will be familiar with, so I won't take up space by repeating it all here).  However, the little sneaky wobbles where you just catch yourself wondering "am I doing this right?"; "is my child ever going to get interested in anything other than Minecraft?"; "should we be doing X Y or Z?" (argh, "should"... *smacks head*  shoulds are never far from the wobbles!)... yes, I get those! 

So I've been thinking about this again, and I've concluded that I'm feeling a bit directionless.  One thing I liked about teaching was having it all laid out before you - the national curriculum clearly showing the way; a nice broad path, clearly marked out, heading ultimately to one goal: GCSEs (or equivalent).  Subjects, Topics, Workbooks, Attainment Targets, Lesson Plans, Assessment Forms - easy peasy (apart from the phenomenal amount of work involved in creating and maintaining all of the above!!).  Of course, the main problem was guiding groups of different children with different abilities and different passions along the same path.  It wasn't in fact a production line where you could put each child through the same process and get the same results at the end.  Some children flourished, some struggled, some were ruined.  Hence the perceived need for Home Education: the chance for us to walk a different path; one of our own making... a little adventure.  No nice straight path here - more of a meander through the woods, exploring whichever openings take our fancy, with some openings leading to dead-ends, some possibly getting a bit boggy, and some leading to absolutely glorious, soul-flooding places of wonder where you just want to set up camp.  Best of all, getting to share that path with the people I love most in the world.

But... do you see the problem?  Wandering in the woods is lovely - truly; it's one of my favourite things to do.  It's just that sometimes you can get a bit lost.  And at times like this you can find yourself longing to be back on the straight open road with signposts everywhere, and the reassurance of millions of other people all doing the same thing...  No?  Well OK, maybe not - but at least a map would be nice!

So that's where I am: a little bit lost.  Yes, we're dong the English & Maths curriculum.  My twin safety blankets of Reading Eggs and MathsWhizz - the equivalent of those little yellow arrows you get in the woods, giving a vague sense of direction (and a little sigh of relief: "oh good, a yellow arrow: at least I'm on a recognised route; even if it's not the one I started on, it'll take me somewhere civilised!").  If sometimes I get a little concerned that the online 'work' is getting too boring for the boys, or it's going against my desire to have them following only their passions, I give them a few days off (like we have this week), and reaasure myself that half an hour a day is hardly going to stop their brains working for themselves.  And yes, I have given myself permission to make suggestions, to invite them into the things that I think would be interesting.  They make suggestions too.  It's nice; we have fun; we learn... I'm just feeling a bit 'where-next'-ish.

OK then, so when I'm lost what do I do?  Well first I try to work out where I am. In HE terms, this is like taking stock of where we are.  Take Eldest this morning.  I didn't think he'd done anything much except mooch, but after a lovely little chat (I wasn't interrogating him honest, just taking an interest!) it turns out he had...
1/ written a poem for Mummy about Mummy
2/ learned about the Tudors and pirates on 'Horrible Histories Gory Games' (TV)
3/ drawn Spongebob cartoons for Middle
4/ built lego constructions
5/ experimented with building a tornado machine using plastic bottles
6/ learned more about wildlife on 'Barney's Barrier Reef' and 'Natural Born Hunters'
7/ read a few books:  the Ultimate Official Guide to Club Penguin,  Waddle On Joke Book,  Professor Bumblebrains Bonkers Book of God
For a mooch, I'd say he's been quite productive!  What a little star!
And as for Middle and Youngest?  They played together really nicely all morning!  Marble runs, Kid K'nex constructions, imaginative role play... and more.  They were playing so nicely I didn't want to interrupt.  Yes I would have liked them doing things I could more easily tick off as 'subjects', but I know better than to try to make them confirm to my wobbly insecurities.  Personally, yes, I would like a bit more structure (not least because a few of my friends are having very successful structured times of it at the moment, which always brings it to my attention again) - but I'm fairly sure that Middle at least would balk at the idea. Eldest might go for it for a while, but he's doing OK without anyway. Youngest has lost any interest in workbooks etc - but he's easy in the sense that he's very definite about his likes and interests. If he wants to learn something you won't stop him, and if he doesn't want to, there's no point trying to persuade him.  Generally, it's quite clear to me that there is still some deschooling in process.

If I know where we are (we're doing OK, learning, and to a degree still deschooling), we can't be totally lost!  The next question then is: do I know where we're going?  Not in terms of having signposts and maps, or tickboxes no - but generally?  I need to remind myself of why I'm doing this - what's the goal?  Basically, we're aiming at producing happy, well-adjusted individuals, capable of discovering and pursuing their own interests.  Exams are not our goal.  When you've been in educational surroundings for as long as I have, it can seem that exam results are the be-all and end-all of education - so forgive me if I'm stating the obvious... I just need to remind myself so I don't go into autopilot.  You know that feeling when you're an experienced driver - you're driving along and realise that you weren't paying full attention, you're just on auto-pilot, following the familar roads that you're used to, to get home or another well-travelled-to destination?  Well in educational terms, exams are my auto-pilot. I need to periodically remind myself that that is NOT our destination any more.  True, they may well be a valuable stop off along the way, to help any of our boys get to where they want to go, but my focus is on producing enthusiastic and capable learners, and eventually adults who are fulfilled in their lives.  The boys don't yet know what they want from lives occupation-wise, so there's no point looking for a map to follow.  We're back to meandering, exploring & looking for the next inspiration to strike.

To go back to where I started then...am I still feeling lost?  Um... well, still a bit directionless, but given that none of the boys have expressed any desire to learn/ achieve any one thing at the moment, that's understandable.  We are heading in the right direction - and I'm pretty sure at least some of us are still deschooling (I certainly am).  Whatever we do, while writing this post I have come to realise again that the hardest thing about HE for me is that I can't use any one method with all three boys.  I think I need to focus again on the best way to help Eldest, the best way to help Middle, and the best way to help Youngest - and see where that leads us.  Following three individual paths at once? Now there's a challenge!  And a whole other blog post!  Excuse me while I go & let my brain whirr...

Mini-Structure and Pop Art

I love Facebook.  I was in a conversation on it the other day, and identifying with that familiar HE struggle between the heart's love of the unschooling philosophy, and the head's need for a degree of structure, for sanity's sake.  This term, although we're only a week in, I feel like we've struck a balance that works for us.  Every day that we're home, the boys (particularly the two older ones) do half an hour (or more if they like - they sometimes do) of Reading Eggspress and MathsWhizz, while I do some reading or maths games with Youngest.  He stalled on Reading Eggs last term, and is still consolidating the skills learned and building his confidence to be able to go back to where he left off.  Also, most days we do an activity of Mummy's suggestion (the boys have the power of veto) - from a list of ideas.  Eg yesterday we played Middle's brilliant new game (another Christmas present), Scabs and Guts.  It's a board game with lots of questions on the body, healthy living etc - it seemed that every other question involved poo, snot & other not-so-refined topics... the boys loved it, of course, and Middle was particularly delighted when one card asked him to do a demonstration of someone with food-poisoning... his acted-out vomiting was very convicing - yeuch!

So other than half an hour of online curriculum in Maths or English, and one activity from Mummy's "what shall we do today" suggestion box, the boys are free to explore, watch, play etc as their interests dictate.  If the TV goes on they watch something that we have recorded (from BBC2's Learning Zone, or CBBC and CBeebies).  Horrible Histories is a particular favourite of Eldest's, and the younger two are currently enjoying William Whiskerson (geography) and Curious Cat (design & technology), which we recorded last term. There are a few great programmes on the internet too (we really like Grid Club) but more often than not, they're just off creating or having fun - not so much evidence of screentime this term ('hooray' says Mummy!)  Sometimes they need/ want my involvement, often they are happy to just get on with whatever it is.  It certainly all seems to be working so far :)  People who are purely unschooling may well suggest that we're not doing it properly by having any structure, and those who are fully structured may be horrified at my doing "so little" with the boys - but it works for us.  At the moment, anyway.  When it stops working, we will find what works better, and adapt.

So yesterday our learning (that I was aware of) looked something like this: Eldest and Middle were on Reading Eggspress while Youngest and I read a few small books from the Oxford Reading Tree - him sounding out & blending the simple words, me reading the ones that he couldn't/ didn't want to read - and of course, having fun chatting about the illustrations, to keep it fun (given the choice of 'sharing a story' or 'practicing reading', I know which seems more appealing!).  Middle baked some smartie cookies, but somehow they all got eaten before I remembered to take a photo - oops; Eldest read his new book, "Predators" (Steve Backshall); we all played the aforementioned delightfully disgusting board game, 'Scabs and Guts', and then Eldest (and Middle) played camera challenges where I had to give them a challenge of something to take a photo of  (eg something with a triangle in it, something with spots/ stripes, something shiny etc.   All in all, a lovely day!  Like I said though, that was just the learning that I noticed - so much of a person's learning just cannot be quantified.  They were off playing and creating for hours - who knows what they were absorbing while enjoying themselves!

And today? Well, we've had MathsWhizz; Horrible Histories and William Whiskerson on TV; Youngest has been further exploring the CBeebies website; Middle counted the bones in his foot (then we looked it up to check the "real" answer); and Mummy's contribution was to make some Pop Art.  I showed the boys Andy Warhol's 'Marilyn' prints in our book, "Famous Paintings."  Eldest remembered it from the from the Art programme they watched last term (recorded from the BBC's learning zone), and they were all keen to get the paints out and have a go at our own version.  I looked online to see if there were any instrictions to follow (I'm not totally confident when it comes to teaching art), but as I couldn't find any, we worked it out as we went along.  In case you fancy a go, this is what we did...

Pop-Art Self-Portraits

We wanted to do four colour variations - and four x A4 would have been too big I felt, so I folded an A4 page in half, to give us a smaller starting area each.  We each drew a basic head (and shoulders) self-portrait.  We are blessed with a photocopy function on our printer, so I made three further A5 copies of each self portrait.  If you don't have access to a photocopier, you could just trace the simple outlines.

   

Next we mixed six colours of paint (I only keep paint in the primary colours plus black and white at home - partly because of limited storage space, partly because it provides plenty of practice at mixing colours).  We decided the best look would be to limit ourselves to using five colours each.  We laid our four identical self-portraits out in front of each of us, and started painting.  It worked better for us to do a kind of production line: rather than completing one self-portrait at a time, we each did all four faces first (making sure each was a different colour), then each mouth etc...

   

That was as much as Youngest could handle really (ie just colouring his faces in with different colours on each page).  With Eldest and Youngest we looked at Warhol's colour variation and talked about how they weren't all uniform - in some of them the eyes and lips were the same colour; in others it was the lips and hair etc.  As we went along we tried to not only vary the features that were the same colour on each self-portrait, but also make sure there was a balance of colour across all four pieces. 

When we had finished filling our faces with colour we looked at how Warhol used colour to make bolder backgrounds than just leaving them white - so (with the exception of Youngest, who declared his to be finished), we assessed our faces so far and looked at which colours would work best as backgrounds to tie the four mini prints into one work of art (that sounds more pontificatory than it actually was).  Most importantly, it was fun, and we're all really happy with our completed "artwork"

 Mummy

 Eldest

 Middle

 Youngest

And then this afternoon we had a play date with the boys' old school friends at a soft play area - so now they're all nicely exhausted and happy from another lovely day.  And what's more, it's now the weekend, so we get Daddy at home too - hooray!  I'm off to enjoy the weekend - hope you have a good one too!

Things I Learned Today

I learned a few things today, some of which have changed the way I see things.  As you will know if you read yesterday's post, I have been feeling bad about how stressed I've been, shouting at the children at times etc.  Last night I was asking myself why I was so stressed, and came to the conclusion that as I didn't stop to process the whole asthma thing with Youngest when it happened, I just went into 'coping mode', and since the nurse has now said it was probably just a viral wheeze, not full-on asthma, maybe I'm just dealing with delayed stress.  Anyway, I was telling that to a friend this morning and I learned again the value of friendship, epsecially with people who know a bit of your history.  She looked straight at me and said, "well it is that time of year" - and the penny dropped.  You see, I've had two miscarriages - the first one saw me in hospital on Christmas Eve, with the staff trying to stop the hemorrhaging while a band played 'Away in a Manger' to the ward outside my room.  The second one was my baby whose due date was Christmas Eve.  So - it's a difficult time of year for me, and although I made a conscious choice at the time that I refuse to let all my Christmases be ruined for the sake of my children and everyone around me, it is true to say that every year the grief sneaks up and bites me on the bum, so to speak.  Grief manifests in so many different ways for every person, but for me in this case, it usually appears as a build-up of stress that sneaks up on me subconsciously, until I register what's going on, acknowledge my babies who aren't with me (usually have a little weep), and then usually feel more peaceful again.  So I learned again that it's time to be kind to myself.

I've learned that those who truly love you are really accepting of you, just the way you are - and boy, do I appreciate that!

I learned that even when you go back to the dentist to have another mould made for your new crown, it still doesn't guarantee that it will fit well.

I also learned that I've been so busy and preoccupied that I've gone and missed the last posting date for Christmas cards!  I guess our friends and relatives are going to be getting late ones this year.  Kicking myself a bit, but there's nothing I can do about it now  - I'm going to be kind to myself!

I learned that cancer isn't that easy to get rid of (not me, but a family member)

I learned that when someone shouts at Eldest, he looks like he's not bothered, but his behaviour goes a bit loopy afterwards.  I learned that when someone shouts at Middle, he takes it on himself to try to make everyone happy again (such a middle child thing!).  While this understanding makes me sad (especially in the light of this week), all understanding of how your child works is a positive thing.  I'm not going to give myself a hard time about the past few days, I'm being kind to myself - and actually, that makes it so much easier to be extra kind to the boys too.

So I'm taking a break (I learned that lesson in the summer, and am revisiting now).  Our holidays don't look all that different from term-time - the boys will still be free to explore and create wherever inspiration takes them, but I will be relaxing the expectation on the boys to do Maths-Whizz/ Reading Eggs, and basically just not being so much 'on duty', feeling the need to be aware of their 'learning' all the time.  Also I'm going to have time off blogging - simply because we're going to be very busy for a week or so now...

So that's me, I'm off for a bit.  I know this post hasn't been all sunshine and laughter, but don't worry, I have three 'babies' here to cuddle, I have good friends and family around me - and as Christians, it is a blessing for us spiritually too... and I simply love it!  So I leave you with my Christmas gift to you: the easiest recipe in the world for making a last-minute tasty snack (we made them the other day & were very glad we did - yummy)!

Cheat's Cheese Straws

Ingredients:
ready-made puff pastry
bowl of grated cheese

Heat the oven to 180C (ish)

Method:
1) roll the puff pastry into a rectangle shape
2) sprinkle grated cheese over half the pastry
3) fold it in half
4) repeat steps 1, 2 and 3 a few times
5) cut into straws or use pastry cutters to make shapes
6) bake for about 10 mins, or until they look cooked (golden-brown on top)

Try not to eat them all at once.

 

So wherever you are, and whatever you're dong, I hope you all have a happy Christmas, and a prosperous New Year!  See you in 2013...

PS This will make you laugh: I also learned that if you try to blog while making the tea, you could end up with soggy pasta and burnt pasta sauce!  Merry Christmas everyone :) xxx

 

Excitement in Pyjamas

Given that today was a low-key pyjama day as has become our habit, it was still a pretty exciting day, most especially for Middle.  Today he "graduated" from Reading Eggs (aimed at 3-7 year olds) to Reading Eggspress (aimed at 7-13 year olds).  He did several lessons in one hit on the last level today as he was so excited to see that he was nearly at the end, and he couldn't wait to be on the same programme as his big brother.  Great was the rejoicing in the house when the Reading Eggspress screen flashed up, and he got to choose his new avatar!  Definitely a proud Mummy moment.  See, Middle struggled academically at school.  He was easily bright enough to do the work, he just didn't fit in the system, and eventually became so depressed that he wouldn't even try.    In six months he has gone from being slightly behind according to Reading Eggs, to ahead for his age.  Now that doesn't actually mean a lot as far as I'm concerned - I always knew he was capable, and I really don't set much store on performance age etc - that's a trap perpetuated by the league tables etc found in the state school system  It's just nice to have a kind of measurable evidence of progress for those who aren't sure of HE, and of course for me if I'm having a wobble.  What means much more to me is that since starting our home education journey Middle has relaxed so fully, I feel like I have my gorgeous, happy, loving boy back.  And quite simply, he was really happy at starting Reading Eggspress - so I am happy for him!

All three boys are now total "Wild Tales" (CBBC) addicts, as evidenced by their excitement at the start of the week being equal to the start of another series - and this week's stars are families of caribou, African wild dogs and polar bears.  There was an entertaining (for me) moment when the caribou gave birth to the baby star of the show, and Eldest asked me what that big red thing was, still hanging from between the caribou's legs.  I explained about placentas etc, and confirmed when asked that yes, I had one for each of my babies - but when I offered to find a picture online to show him, I was answered with an unequivocal "Ewww NO THANKS!".  Apparently that's an education too far right now!  (boys are weird: I am expected to come running to admire the size of their latest toilet-blocking faecal product, but looking at a picture of a placenta online is gross?  Go figure...)
Anyway (moving right along), following Wild Tales we watched an episode of the fun and informative Richard Hammond's Blast Lab, and learned about the surface tension of water.  We did a quick impromptu demonstration of water filled to the brim of a glass, to see if the boys could see the slight dome shape made by the water surface as we added a little more water.  They could, and were dutifully impressed... but were more excited by the splashes made when Mummy accidentally dropped too much water in suddenly - who said education isn't allowed to be exciting?

A different kind of excitement was also provided today by our Christmas Decorations book.  Normally I would prefer something less prescriptive - something that we could design ourselves and be a bit more organic in our creating - but this weekend was pretty full of house-sorting (we culled the toys in Middle and Youngest's room ready for Christmas, and are trying to restore the study into a functional space, rather than the dumping ground it has become) - and I ran out of time to have a look for some more creative crafts or other activities, so we grabbed this book off the shelf, and got the scissors & sellotape out.  It may not have seemed that exciting to me, but anything that reminds the boys of the fast-approaching season is guaranteed to riase the levels of enthusiasm in the house!  And an hour or so later, we had quite a few pretty Christmas decorations ready to be hung/ stuck to windows...

The lovely thing was that even though I personally found the ready-to-cut patterns a bit uninspiring, the boys really got into it - and very quickly came up with further ideas of their own.  Eldest made a rather complicated 3D Christmas tree model that took him a while (cue much muttering), but he persevered with his design and the end product looked great.  Then he followed it with a stand-up santa hat, and a star decoration.  Middle made some decorations out of cellophane and card - and Youngest flitted between making decorations and drawing letters with a stencil he had found.  He was so excited by producing his own letters, bless him - I guess he's ready to learn to write then!  Sadly I can't post photos of the boys' original decorations as they seem to have been squirreled away, probably in the boys' bedrooms... well, I suppose I should be impressed that the bedroom-tidyness lasted a whole day!

Thank you, Christmas DVD!

Feeling a bit direction-less at the moment.  The boys are (mostly) happy carrying on with their 30minutes a day of Maths Whizz/ Reading Eggs, but they seem to have lost enthusiasm for other activities - and that may be at least partly due to my enthusiasm waning.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not going off Home Education - in fact the more I think about State Education, the more huge flaws I can see in it - and the more I am convinced I want better for my boys.  But within the Home Education that we are experiencing, I'm feeling a bit dissatisfied - as if I'm missing something.

One thing that really hasn't helped is not having my laptop.  I know it sounds silly, and possibly a bit shallow - but I hadn't realised how much I got done on it while being in the same room as and instantly available to the boys of an afternoon, while they learned stuff off the TV or read books/ played/ drew etc.  Now that the only available PC is in the study, I have to choose between being with the boys or leaving them to get on with what they're doing while I grab some computer time - and that makes for dissatisifaction whichever way I go.  It's not just the blog (which I can feel slipping), nor the quick (hopefully encouraging) chats on Facebook; it's all the research I used to do without noticing at the time - finding new resources to build on whatever the boys are learning at that point, or being able to look up answers to questions there and then, etc.  I only tend to get about 1 - 1 1/2 hours to myself in the evenings once all the boys are in bed and the hedgehogs weighed & cleaned out - I can't even get the Christmas shopping done in that time, let alone research, blogs and chatting.  And as for my beloved photos - well they're all backing up on my camera's SD card.  It's going to take a very long time to go through those when I get round to it!

Anyway, enough complaining.  I'm not trying to depress myself or anyone reading - just noting it down as part of our journey - this is a "warts-and-all" account, after all!

Despite feeling a bit unsettled, we've had a lovely couple of days since I last posted.  We had a go at an "Underwater Hippo" art project from the lovely Deep Space Sparkle website, using a paint wash over oil pastels.  Previously I had been sad to miss out on making my own 'art' because I was so busy helping the boys - so this time I made sure I attempted the project alongside them. The only problem was, Youngest got a bit impatient and just did his own thing.  Actually that's not really a problem at all: it's good for him to just get a chance to try out different mediums etc, in whatever way he wants.  I have to say though, his finished result does not really resemble the hippos we were aiming at - although he said he wanted to show all the blood inside the hippo, so with that in mind, you may be better able to 'interpret' his art!

 

Eldest's Hippo                                        Middle's Hippo

 

 

Mummy's Hippo                                   Youngest's Hippo

While Eldest's paint was drying he was still in arty mode, and decided he wanted to draw a Creeper from Minecraft.  I love how he got the pixellated effect - it took quite a lot of patience.  Then Middle wanted to do some more marbling, so we got the inks out again and created lots more sheets to hopefully use on our Christmas cards...

Also this week we've been following some more familes of wild animals on the CBBC series, Wild Tales.  This time it's been about cheetahs, wolves and zebras, and today Youngest decided he wanted to be one of the cheetahs because they're so fast.  We agreed that Mummy would have to be a zebra because they're the only vegetarians on the show.  Eldest and Middle wanted to be wolves because Eldest liked the extended family and Middle thought the wolf cubs' faces were the cutest. 

While Eldest and Middle have been on their internet curricula, Youngest and I have been reading together.  He got to another stage that was slightly beyond him, so I've been looking for ways to consolidate the learning he has done so far.  He totally gets phonics from the point of view of blending sounds together, so Reading Eggs has been great for him so far.  However, he has only mastered the simple phonic sounds so far (the short vowel sounds and single letter sounds b,p,t etc)  However, he can't progress much further in Reading Eggs without mastering the digraphs that he seems to have been blustering his way past (eg 'th' - two letters that make one sound - he would sound out the t then the h, making it impossible to read the word 'the').  If he was happy to re-do lessons from earlier in Reading Eggs, I think he would pick it up quickly, but he's not interested.  Anyway, while I was looking around I found the first of the new Oxford Reading Tree Songbirds books - written by the excellent Julia Donaldson, of Gruffalo fame (amongst many other fabulous books).  I'm not usually a big fan of reading schemes, but this first book (a collection of twelve simple stories) is exactly right for Youngest.  All the other books we had were beyond him, as they introduced digraphs etc almost immediately, but this one starts off blending simpler sounds, without him having to master more complicated ones.  He is starting to show signs of recognising common words by their shapes (such as 'the'), but there's no hurry: he's a bright little thing & I know he'll get there in his own time, so for now we're just enjoying sitting down with a book and him saying "I can read this one to you Mummy!"

Oh, and other than all of the above, Christmas DVDs are now the order of the day - or afternoon!  We let the boys watch our new copy of Arthur Christmas on the long car journey to Exeter the other day, and that got them fully in the festive mood - so even though it's still only November (just), I'm going along with the holiday viewing.  I don't take much persuading really - though I still refuse to put up the tree until mid-December!  Still, thanks to today's Christmas DVD, I got to write in this 'ere blog - so not all bad, eh?

Normal Service to be Resumed Shortly

Hooray for time off!  My brain is starting to return to normal again - we've had a lovely week just enjoying being together, with no pressure - I guess it was a sort of half-term, in that we had got to a point of needing a break.  It kind of felt a little naughty, as the schools here aren't on half-term for another week and a half - but then, the boys were gearing up their 'learning' before the schools went back in September, so it's not really surprising that we were a bit tired sooner.  And anyway, one of the many things that I love about HE is that we can just take a break whenever we need to, rather than dragging our feet for weeks until we get scheduled time off :)

So anyway, if you've been following, you'll know I've been thinking about restrictions, suggestions, structure etc, and I think I've decided on the 'tweaks' that I started suspecting we needed a week ago in Not-so-helpful Suggestions. 

Firstly, we had been running a "no-screen-time until after lunch" rule, which kind of bit me on the bum as it seemed to generate a desire for screen-time AS SOON AS allowed.  I'm going to tweak that so that although Mummy will still have no laptop time before lunch (otherwise blogging/ facebook/ photobooks would leech all my time with the boys), the boys are free to watch TV/ go on the PC whenever they like.  After all, it really wasn't an issue when they were deschooling: they watched less then than they do now.  The thing I do have an issue with is the games consoles.  A chat with my wise friend helped me to realise that PC time is actually OK - pretty much the whole time they are on it, they are learning something valuable.  Games consoles however seem to shut down their ability to think creatively.  They're OK for encouraging teamwork occasionally (depending on the game), but on the whole they seem pretty mind-numbing.  So I'm not going to ban them or place set restrictions specifically - but I am hoping to just try to distract the boys away from playng on them if they are mentioned - with the aim that maybe we'll save them for weekends/ holidays... we'll see how it goes, anyway.

Secondly, I was concerned that by making suggestions so frequently, the boys were depending on me for ideas instead of thinking creatively for themselves, and finding their own inspiration.  Where I had viewed suggestions as just a verbal kind of strewing, it turns out that actually they carry more weight than books/ resources just left hanging about, as the boys perceive that I want them to do the things I'm suggesting.  And it's true, I do - although usually just because it looks like fun, and we do usually have fun - but by relying on my suggestions every day they were making noticeably less effort to discover their own interests.  It's not the worst thing in the world in terms of Home Education, but it's just not what I want for them.  So I think I'm going to restrict myself.  Some kind of schedule really does help me, albeit a very gentle, flexible one - so I think I'm going to limit my suggestions to my favourite days, Mondays, and see how it goes.  Tuesday - Friday it will be all about the boys finding/ developing their own ideas, but that still leaves me with a day when I get to suggest things that I've seen that I think they'd like that they otherwise wouldn't have thought of.  I'm not totally convinced about this, but we'll give it a go and see what we learn :)

Thirdly I was thinking about structure: the small amount of online curriculum that I ask of them.  I never get into a fight about it with them - if they really resist, I don't push it - but I do ask them to do an hour each of Reading Eggs & MathsWhizz per week, and I still feel that for us, that is about right.  I've been reading comments from people who home educate in a much-more structured way, and I have to say, it does appeal to my routine-loving teacher-head; I'm just not convinced that the boys would go for it...  actually, I'm convinced one of them would really struggle - so we're going to keep it light and do the minimum that I am happy with, leaving them the rest of the time to be as "autonomous" as they like (as long as that doesn't involve games consoles!!!)

So that's where we're at now - hooray for wobbles that cause me to step back and reboot :)  Tomorrow we have our regular '360 soft play' HE group trip, which is always lovely, and then next week is going to be really busy with Legoland (hooray for them letting Home Educators visit at school prices!), visiting best friends, HE coffee morning & Usborne book sale, barbers visit and non-school photos - so all of the above is on hold until the following week anyway, but I feel better for having had the chance to sort my brain out!

Also, today I received my copy of A Funny Kind of Education by Ross Mountney.  Ross wrote the first book I ever read on HE, Learning without School, when we were first serously considering Home Education early this year.  It was absolutely the best book I could have read at the time - answered all of our practical questions and encouraged me that we could do it.  Ross's experience as well as her practical, humorous, non-judgemental style makes her one of my favourite Home Ed authors (she has a brilliant blog too: here), so I'm really looking forward to reading this new book, a more personal account of her HE journey with her own family.  Actually *whispers* I read a few chapters earlier when the boys were occupied with other things - I couldn't resist - and I can already see that it's going to be a fun and encouraging read.  Having met Ross online since reading her first book, I know she is such a lovely person that she often reads other HE blogs and offers encouragement, so I'm fairly sure she'll be reading this, blushing away (Hi Ross, *cheeky grin*) - but this isn't flattery: I honestly and strongly recommend her books!

Finally, mini-blogger's fans will be pleased to know he has written some more in his diary (so much for my concerns in September that he wasn't interested in writing) - so I'll leave you in his entertaining little hands...

13th October
11:02am
played predator with (Middle).  I was
     1st - snowleopard
     2nd - octopus
     3rd - lion. 
     Yep, (Middle) was the prey and would not survive in the wild.

17th October
8:08am 
at the 14th, 15th and 16th I didn't feel writey!  Feel a bit writey now.

7:05pm 
normal day.  I did
two days ago - waking up, eating, sleeping
one day ago - waking up, eating, sleeping
today - waking up, eating, sleeping
tomorrow - waking up, eating, sleeping
Where's entertainment when you NEED IT!

7:26pm
calmed down
Bored, have a cold, and MESSY room.  "BOOOO!"
I'm so annoyed that my room is a mess, I'm reduced to a puddle.

7:41pm
froze to normal shape, no longer puddle

18th October
9:12am
at night, hedgehog in garden - amazing
morning, woodpecker in woods - amazing
5 min ago, tidy up - not amazing
VERY WRITEY ME

A PS to Yesterday's Post - and some lovely Art

Well that was a great big long blog post yesterday - and it completely failed to make the point that I was supposed to be trying to get to (combination of running out of time and just getting distracted by my own waffle - oops!  Don't think I'll ever make a pro-blogger ;) )

Anyway, I was talking about why I see the need for us to use online curricula, even though we are stongly drawn to the 'unschooling' end of the HE spectrum.  We've been 'doing' Home Ed since Easter this year: more deschooling than anything else which has been incredibly helpful - I strongly recommend it to anyone just embarking on their HE adventure.  Now we're entering a new 'term', I've been taking stock of where we're all at...  Firstly, I cannot imagine ever sending my children back to school - socially and emotionally the boys are doing SO MUCH better than they were at school. Academically though... (let's say for the sake of argument that it can be sectioned off as a separate entity) - well... Youngest has made undoubted progress, largely thanks to his passionate love of Reading Eggs (an online curriculum).  Middle and Eldest?  I have to say, their "abilities" have gone backwards in some areas.  Their confidence and reasoning has made great leaps, so I think on balance it was easily worth it.  However, when Eldest had a go at the 'Reading Eggspress' programme that he's lately been pestering me to try, he was assessed at a lower age than he actually functions at in my opinion - because through lack of usage he had forgotten what verbs, nouns etc were.  Middle has also regressed a bit when it comes to Maths - forgetting how to perform certain tasks that are actually useful (that's the bit where I left off in the previous post I think).  Anyway, combined with yesterday's conclusion that standard maths skills (such as times tables, carrying/ regrouping, even long division) are really useful tools to have at one's disposal, my observation that the boys' learning in these two key areas (Maths & English) has gone back a little was the final factor that convinced me my instincts weren't all wrong... for now at least... until I change my mind again ;)

Anyway, so that's what I was trying to say yesterday!  On to today, and over all it's been lovely :)  Eldest had another temperature spike today & was feeling weedy, so we decided not to go to craft club.  That sad decision aside, the rest of the day was fun (in a gentle way).  Eldest was keen to get back onto his Reading Eggspress trial - he seems to be enjoying it still.  Youngest was also keen (as always) to get onto Reading Eggs, and spent some time happily engrossed on that.  Which left me some time with Middle, going over a Maths worksheet that I made for him, with lots of space on the paper to work out his 'regrouping' - and only eight sums on the whole page so it wasn't too intimidating.  We got the cuisenaire rods out and went through the whole process, showing him how regrouping works in a visual way - and he seemed to grasp it very quickly after that.  He still wasn't keen on doing the page of sums, but fortunately for me there is a fail-safe key to motivating him... reverse psychology works every time!  If you try to jolly him along gently saying "come on, this is easy, you can do it" he just stalls, whines, procrastinates - basically does anything except what you're looking at.  But if you say "uh-oh, I thik this one's too hard, surely you can't be clever enough to work that out", he loves it!  It baffles me, and doesn't come naturally as I like to speak positive words over my children  - but it absolutely works (for him - his brothers are a different matter), and as long as I say it in a jokey enough manner, he thinks it's the most fun we can have!  So anyway, one page of eight sums later, and he's really happy with addition using regrouping (we'll move on to subtraction next time).

After that we went to the bank to pay in the money we counted up yesterday, and had a lovely chat with a lady who was very interested and encouraging when she found out that we home educate.  Eldest then had a rest when we got back, and got engrossed in a cartoon book (I've recently introduced him to our Calvin & Hobbes books... he's hooked!)  Time for some "Deadly 60" and "Horrible Histories Gory Games" on TV, and then on to the highlight of our day...

Middle had been asking to do some art, and I found a really lovely project on one of my favourite art websites, Deep Space Sparkle... we painted some long thin 'birch trunks', left them to dry and painted the background on another page, using watered-down paint, and then sprinkling with salt for an attempt at a snowy effect (my paint was already too dry so it didn't work very well, but Middle's worked well)  Eldest's trees looked really effective I thought - and the beauty of this project was that even Youngest aged 3 (almost 4) was able to produce a lovely piece of art (although I did have to take the black paint away as he was getting carried away doing the tree trunks)...  The cutting out was straight-forward (I helped Youngest as there were a lot of splodges and he couldn't see where to cut!), and we glued the trunks on to the background using PVA (glue-sticks didn't work well with the salt), then putting heavy books on top while the glue dried - we all think they look great :)

 

 

Middle's "Birch Trees"                        Youngest's "Birch Trees"

 

 

Eldest's "Birch Trees"                         Mummy's "Birch Trees"

Lovely art project - lovely day :)

Maths Morning

It was a seemingly contradictory day today: we spent much of the morning doing practical Maths in various guises (but not Maths Whizz) - and I realised why I still feel the need to have the boys use an online Maths curriculum.  Friends who advocate 'unschooling' or child-led learning often say that Maths is everywhere, and there is no need for a curriculum.  They do have a really good point, but regular readers will know this is the area where I am least confident.  This morning's fun at least demonstrated what they are talking about...

First of all, prompted by Middle's struggles with MathsWhizz addition/ subtraction using carrying (or "regrouping" for the up-to-date among you), I had bought a set of Cuisenaire Rods (a friend was going to loan some to us but then I realised how stressed I would get desperately trying not to lose any small bits, so we found a cheapish set to buy for ourselves!).  He is such a visual learner, I think it will help him get to grips with the grouping/ carrying concept.  Anyway, he found the set of rods first thing this morning and immediately wanted a go - the bright colours appealing to his creative side and the stacking rods appealing to his love of order (this was before we even had a chance to have breakfast).  We went through the set finding out what colour all the different number-rods were, then we matched them up to see how many different ways we could make 'tens' - the teacher in my head was mentally ticking off 'number-bonds', while he was just playing and having fun!  He then progressed to using them to play a game that basically revolved around times tables - not that he knew that.  His enthusiastic squeals soon called his brothers, and next thing I knew they were all playing with "Mummy's New Maths Game" - amongst other things making one huge rod two-hundred-and-fourteen squares long (according to Eldest).

The rods had to go away for breakfast then, but were such a success, I'm confident Middle will be happy to play some more with them when we have another look at the Maths he got stuck on :)

Our next Maths encounter was a result of the car-boot sale I did at the weekend - I tipped out the coins onto the table, and the two older boys helped me sort them into piles, count the totals and bag them, ready to be banked :)

Following that, there were various maths-based games and puzzles, including Electronic Battleships (Eldest v the computer); a jigsaw puzzle aimed at 5-year-olds that Youngest did without batting an eyelid, and the Bus Stop game from Orchard Toys.   Today was also Eldest's turn to bake, and he made some scrummy Orangle Drizzle cakes (after an emergency dash to the smallholding up the road where we buy our eggs) - there's plenty of Maths to be found in measuring out ingredients, dividing cake mixture etc - and we got to eat them too... edible Maths is my favourite!

Of course, it wasn't all Maths today - Eldest (who is recovering from some nasty virus picked up this weekend) and I had some lovely snuggle time on the sofa, watching our garden wildlife - including a very shy mouse and some beautful long-tailed tits - and we all played a game or two of Animal Soundtracks (great for encouraging listening skills), and Middle and Youngest spent a fair time on Reading Eggs too!  It's just that it did help me to see how Maths really does fit naturally into our everyday lives, without them going near MathsWhizz.

So that said, why do I still feel the need for online (or even workbook-driven) curriculum, such as MathsWhizz?  Well, bearing in mind that this is still all fairly experimental (we're still in novice-territory, so may well change our mind next month/ week/ tomorrow), it was partly a conversation that I had with Hubby that crystalised my thoughts.  I can't remember how it came up, but he basically mentioned that he never learned his times tables at school (his family moved around quite a bit when he was young, so presumably it just fell by the way in one of the gaps between schools).  This was supposed to be a positive point, showing that even though he didn't complete all the basic requirements conventionally expected by a formal education, he still went on to do very well for himself (got Maths A-level, has good job etc).  On the other hand, I can vividly remember learning my times tables (mostly I remember a little green paperback book purchased for me by my Mum who wanted to help consolidate what I was presumably learning at school).  Hubby said that not having learned his times tables hadn't hindered him at all - he could still work out whatever mental maths he needed to do; it just takes him a little longer than those who had learned them (eg me).  So if I was in a situation where I needed to know - say - 6x7, I would instantly know the answer was 42.  Hubby would still get the same answer (he's a clever chap), but he would have to work it out.  Not much of a draw-back, really.  It just got me to thinking then about when I missed two weeks of secondary school due to illness, and consequently never learned how to do long division.  "No big deal" you might think, but you'd be surprised how many times it came up throughtout my adult life... not on a daily basis, but often enough to frustrate me that I couldn't do it.  It wasn't until I needed to teach my students how to do it that I finally got round to teaching myself how to do it - and now it's another skill under my belt :)  Of course, some may argue that my teaching myself is proof that my boys could teach themselves if they ever find themselves wanting to know how to do it - and they'd have a point - but all these little things come together to where I am at the moment, thinking that these maths skills traditionally learned at school actually do have value.  If we didn't have MathsWhizz, would Middle ever learn to do "regrouping/ carrying"?  Maybe, maybe not.  How about times tables or long division? If he didn't, it certainly wouldn't be the end of the world - neither Hubby nor I were held back by our learning gaps - but how many so-called 'learning gaps' am I comfortable to risk him having?  And basically, as we do have the opportunity at our fingertips for him (and his brothers) to learn those skills, as long as he is (they all are) enjoying it, we're going to make full use of the online curriculum available - and also carry on having fun seeing how Maths fits into our every day lives too... for now, anyway!  It's not a set philosophy - I certainly wouldn't try to tell anyone else they should or shouldn't do it this way... it's just a record in my diary of where we're at right now ;)

And finally: I've said this before, but was reminded again today of one of the benefits of HE.  Having had a nasty virus this weekend with accompanying alarmingly high temperature, Eldest seemed to be nicely on his way back to full health today.  Had we been in school, I might have been tempted to send him in so he didn't fall behind academically (and so I could fulfil my teaching responsibilities).  I'm so grateful we didn't even have to think about it.  Sadly we did have to cancel a visit to some lovely friends who we were looking forward to seeing - but we're hoping to reschedule soon, and I was just so grateful that Eldest was free to take the day at his own pace, learning naturally wherever he felt up to it, and resting when he needed... and of course, I was on hand to keep an eye on him, for my own peace of mind.  Thank God for Home Ed :)

PS For those who like to share such things, here are our favourite garden visitors from today...