Doing Nothing in a Festive Way

I've discovered a few set-backs to Home Education that I hadn't anticipated.  This time last year we were all at school, but Youngest and I were mornings-only, so I would bring him home at lunchtime, put him to bed for a nap, and then get the lights up ready to surprise the older boys when they came home from school later.  This year I don't get that lovely sense of looking forward to their delighted response.  However, we do have a lot more time together to just enjoy all the loveliness of the season, so I figure I can't complain really!  Also, as they are at home all the time they have persuaded me to put the tree up sooner that I usually would.  That's not such a bad thing either - I just know from experience that I usually get fed up of the decorations cluttering up the house within a couple of weeks, so it does mean I'll need to be patient, waiting for my 'undecorating' day.

The other drawback I discovered after writing my previous post: apparently the seasonal slow-down is not only common, but it seems that rather than Home Edders being all jolly at this time of year, 'tis the season to be "wobbly".  Of course, we are a pretty jolly lot - why wouldn't we be?  We get to immerse ourselves in the season as much as we like, without having to run around sorting out last-minute nativity costumes, gifts for the school staff, and enough Christmas cards for every child in the class/ school, as well as trying to persuade tired grumpy children that they do want to get up when it's dark, go to school in the cold and not come home until it's dark again.  But - the wobbles, so I am told, are really common at this time of year.  I wonder if that's a result of the slow-down.  Certainly in this house our HE experience includes a lot of getting out and about, experiencing nature etc - and I think that inevitably brings a greater sense of being in tune with the seasons.  So as I wrote previously, we have slowed down, are doing less trips out and group activities, cosying down more at home, doing more passive learning such as on the TV or computer - all of which makes it feel like we're not doing much of value - and there's no quicker way to bring on the wobbles, or make you question your ability as a home educator, than to assess your progress in terms of "haven't done much lately"  Well, the upside to that is that thanks to the lovely online communities, I am now aware that it's a common HE phenomenon - so it makes it much easier to roll with it, and give in to the desire to just hibernate.  It's just a season - and seasonal living is the most natural way to live.

So this week we're indulging ourselves in Christmas preparations.  So far we've been making LOTS of cards (it's really lovely to have the time to make them ourselves)...

my favourites are the ones at the front, made using the paper we marbled ourselves

We've been looking again at the First Christmas (using DVDs, our Playmobil nativity set etc - we liked this Beatbox version on Youtube); we've decorated the tree...

We've made Christmas biscuits from this book...



We've learned about some Christmas traditions (my current favourite one being that naughty Dutch children don't get coal in their stocking, they get taken off to Spain!); we've drawn Christmas pictures (like this one of "Fat Santa" by Middle)...

We've read christmas stories; we've listened to Christmas music and learned some Christmas songs (especially Eldest, who loves singing along to the radio)... we've even lit Christmas candles to complete the full five-senses experience! 

And if you're having a "done nothing" kind of day & are feeling inadequate in comparison to that impressive list, let me reassure you that I didn't think we'd done anything either until I wrote it down, so maybe you've done more than you think too - but even if you haven't, don't worry: it's just a seasonal thing.  Pour yourself a glass of mulled wine or raid the selection box and just enjoy your hibernation... see you in the Spring!

PS Just after I'd posted this blog entry the boys found the tinsel that we haven't used anywhere yet this year, and they started playing with it. Middle and Youngest are making letters, numbers, words etc out of it on the floor.  So of course I had to post some photos... how very HE!

 

Snow Day!

Just a quick one as we've been too busy having fun today (and creating mess - which I now need to clean up)...

Hooray for snow days!  And hooray for Home Ed, which means we get to enjoy snow days instead of being stuck inside cold classrooms, trying to get our frozen hands and brains to work, but not able to just go outside and play in the pretty white stuff...

One benefit of snow is the speed at which the boys got dressed this morning!  They were up, breakfasted and outside playing before 9am - building snowmen, snowforts & snowballs, and sledging.  You could say it's a multi-curricular activity: Art (3D sculpture); PE (throwing, running and racing); Maths (shape, size, trajectories, speed); D&T (designing and working with transient materials); Science (freezing/ melting, and the human body in extreme temperatures - oh, and weather, obviously!) etc etc... or you could say we played in the snow, and not feel the need to justify it academically!  Learning is everywhere: living is learning, and the more experiences we are exposed to, the more we just learn.  Simple as that.

Eventually, after all the snow play (& learning), we all came indoors for an obligatory hot chocolate, and watched "The Snowman" and "Father Christmas" on DVD, before heading out to an HE playdate with friends, taking some Christmas 'stained glass window biscuits' that we had made for the occasion, from this book.

After lunch at home we watched today's episode of "Wild Tales", which contained a very sad scene - exposing the boys to the less pretty side of wildlife, as well as giving us the chance to chat about how programmers use music to make you feel more sad/ happy etc (all through the rest of the programme the boys were all more alert to the background music that was being played, and how it made them feel, as well as giving them clues to what was coming next).  One of this week's stars is a polar bear cub, and after the programme ended we had a go at making our own polar bear pictures on glitter paper (though the glitter is very subtle & doesn't show up well in the photos).  Eldest chose to do a variation on the North Pole theme - and then couldn't resist doing an underwater Arctic scene too...

Mummy's Polar Bears

Middle's Polar Bears

 



Youngest's Polar Bear and Walrus

Eldest's "Seal Hill"

(he couldn't have seals and polar bears in the same scene because the bears would eat the seals!)

Eldest's "Arctic Ocean"

Oh, and in other news, the hedgehogs Midge and Squidge, are both now over 700g each (Midge is almost 800g, the porker!), and will soon be moving to the garage to acclimatise to cooler temperatures before being moved to the shed, hopefully to hibernate for the winter, so I have educated myself on further essential things I need to know about hibernating (such as how to tell the difference between a sleeping hedgehog, a hibernating hedgehog, and a dead one!)

So all in all, that was a lovely day.  Now though, I'm off to clear up puddles left by wellies, sledges etc.  If anyone has any genius ideas for non-messy fun, let me know!

Versions of Creativity

Today's highlight was the return of Craft club - from the moment we got up, Youngest kept repeating every few minutes "Is it time for craft club yet?"  He even had his shoes on before he'd started breakfast, he was so keen!  It was lovely to see everyone again, and the boys had a great time creating models based on pinch pots, out of clay.  Well, Eldest and Middle made models -Youngest just had fun bashing, poking and squishing - and then ran about generally having fun wile the older ones modelled.  I don't have photos yet as we'll have to wait until they've been through the kiln, painted & so on - but while we wait we can always paint our models that we made last week (with air-drying clay) which have finally dried - so hopefully there will be photos of those coming soon!

We also had a couple of musical moments today - listening to Classic FM on the way to craft club, there was a piece playing by Brahms that had the boys puzzled - they spotted the instruments that were playing without problem, but when it came to how it felt, they weren't sure whether it was happy, sad or something else (it sounded a bit confused or 'all-over-the-place' to me too!) Then they decided the music was painting a picture of an undersea adventure: the happy bits were when the divers were looking at fish and dolphins, and the scary bits were when a shark popped out etc. They kept adding to their narrative as the music progressed - we all liked the piece better after their creative interpretation ;) The second musical moment was when I walked into the lounge to find Middle watching a programme with a live band playing, and I grabbed his hands & we had a little dance round the room, culminating in me teaching him how to twist - it only took five minutes, but it was a lovely moment :)

This afternoon Youngest passed another 'end of stage' test on Reading Eggs - but cheerfully announced to me that Middle had helped him "a little bit" - and when I asked Middle about it, he confessed that he had done the entire test for Youngest!  Talk about frustrating!  He was probably either too tired to be doing it or had been on it too long & got a bit bored.  I wish I'd known!  Anyway, Middle & I had a chat about how it hasn't actually helped Youngest in the long run - hopefully he won't do it again.  Frustrated?  Yes, but I can also choose to be proud of Youngest's "creative" problem-solving, and of Middle's confident willingness to help...

This is why I blog really, because I don't want to forget the beauty in the little things. I almost thought today's stuff was "too ordinary" to write about, but there can be joy in the mundane (especially when I look back after time has passed), and blogging about the 'every-day' highs and lows is my own 'creative' way of trying to make sure I don't miss things in all the busy-ness.  It all goes by so fast, I feel like I want to find a 'slow-motion' button.  Parents everywhere will tell you that children grow so much faster than you can keep up with, and blogging for me is like a textual version of all the photos I take (and I do take lots!): a way of celebrating the 'now'.  The blog and my photos are my 'slow-motion' buttons, allowing me to rejoice in both the fun and the harder bits, and storing up memories to treasure... and of course, if all of that entertains/ encourages others on a similar journey, well that would really be the icing on the cake! 

Structure - not all bad...

It was an early start for us this morning as we needed to get my car to the garage.  With the boys squashed in the back of Daddy's car (he drove my car with the dodgy brakes & we followed so we could bring him back), we had an impromptu Music non-lesson: we put Classic FM on the car radio, and for each tune that we listened to, we all clapped along to the beat (including DS3 who has a very natural sense of rhythm), then we identified the instruments that we could hear playing, and we described the music - was it happy, sad, relaxed, scary?  Finally, we closed our eyes and descibed pictures in our imagination while the music was playing.  There were some lovely descriptions shared, including horses running (and flying), a river turning into a waterfall, a big purple bird in its nest, camping with Daddy - and then DS1 & 2 joined together for the final piece of music, with DS1 imagining Road Runner and DS2 imagining Wil E Coyote: they came up with a kind of tag-team running commentary which was really sweet :)
Once we were home, the boys were all keen to get the rest of their stars again (that's 3 days in a row... it's working really well as an incentive this week)... 
DS1 did two (!!!) pages of Maths, then found his Handwriting workbook and copied out the cursive letters.  His handwriting isn't bad, but the style of cursive he had learned at school was highly looped and I wasn't at all keen on it, so I gave him the option of practicing a simpler style if he wanted to - and he jumped at the chance.  It was slightly boring for him, but he tends to fluctuate between choosing the easiest workbook or the most interesting workbook - and today was definitely an 'easiest' day ;)  He also had fun creating his own board game - something he quite often does (he loves creating and he loves people having to follow his rules ;) )
DS3 had a lovely time with his Reading Eggs again - especially enjoying the extra game where he got to match up the sound to the animal - and once he finished on the computer, he had a VERY happy time doing baking with Mummy... I haven't seen that much mess created in such a short time, but boy, did we have fun!!!  (And the melting choc muffins from our Children's Book of Baking Cakes were scrummy!)

DS2 decided he wanted another go at Reading Eggs himself, so I set him up with a new trial.  I'm still not convinced they diagnosed him at the right level - it seems a bit easy for him still, but I guess it's important that he enjoys it and it builds his confidence.  We'll carry on with the trial and see if it holds his interest - as with his brothers, if it's on the computer he thinks he's playing, so we may well stick with it, not least to build his familiarity with technology, which is increasingly important in this day and age.  Later he also had fun helping me cook tea, chopping veg etc - it is always nice having an enthusiastic 'assistant'... it may take longer in the long run, but as long as I allow extra time, it makes it more fun, and let's face it, it's a really important life skill!
So all in all, that's three fairly 'academic' days so far this week - but really happy ones!  Having read an entry on 'How do I home educate', from my favourite blog, An Ordinary Life, I was encouraged that having a bit of planning and structure does not have to be a bad thing.  Much of the Home Ed philosophy that I have come across so far has leaned far more towards the unstructured, autonomous type of 'unschooling'.  I expected myself to be too stressed to be able to do that (funnily enough, I haven't been at all stressed), and I've been done my best to avoid rigid structure, preferring to give my children space to relax & rediscover their innate love of learning.  However, as the author of the blog above helped me to see, it is possible to have lovely, relaxed & creative time together, while also having some idea of watching their progress.  I don't want to get all inflexible on the boys - I love that they can choose what they want to learn... but it's not completely autonomous.  They seem OK with the expectation that they will do something that looks like schoolwork, and we all love the times when we've been playing and they get a star on their chart when they didn't realise they were learning :)  I can still see the appeal of unschooling - not having to label what they've done, or divide it into subjects - just letting them learn through play.  At the moment though, a little bit of structure is working well for us, so we're happy to work (and play) with that :)

Getting musical

Not great weather today (though the boys did get outside to play in the garden briefly just before tea, and got very muddy, but hey, that's what washing machines are for...) so we had the whole morning and a good part of the afternoon spent indoors.  We went out in the afternoon for a much needed but disliked (by Mummy) trip to the barbers, and to post some cards.  (Disliked because queues in barbers + queues in Post Office + lively boys who have been cooped up all day = stressed Mummy :(  Anyway, once back home and safely away from the disapproving stares of trendily shorn young men and ancient & unsympathetic Post Office ladies, and we had a good time, sparked at teatime...
Now, my boys are not what you call speedy eaters, by any stretch of the imagination: they are aware of the food and the need to get it in their mouths, but they take a very l-e-i-s-u-r-e-l-y approach to actually doing it.  I guess it's nice to have that social time of chatting & laughing, and none of them seem to have inherited my dislike of eating once-hot-food-now-gone-cold, which is just as well, it just means Mummy spends lots of time looking at my empty plate and their still-mostly-full ones.  Anyway, during these unhurried meals we had Classic FM playing on the kitchen radio - and DS1 started seeing if he could spot the instruments playing at any one time.  DS2 quickly joined in (I was impressed at how accurate his listening was) and DS3 - not to be outdone - joined in, calling out random instruments regardless of whether they were playing or not.  That progressed to DS2 doing a beautiful impression of a "commander" (conductor), followed by some impressive air violin (and then air-guitar rock-star style, courtesy of DS3 who more than makes up in enthusiasm whatever he lacks in understanding)  It was so much fun :)  Tea went cold (again) but was eventually eaten, and Mummy's equilibrium was restored.  Music is known to have restorative powers, but so does the sight of my children having good old innocent fun!
In fact, it's prompted me to look out some CDs and a book I have called The Story of the Orchestra, so the boys can have a look tomorrow, and see what it inspires :)