Finding our own routine

It has been nearly 6 months since my last post!!! Life just seems to fly by these days with very little time to sit and write.

We still absolutely love home education. As time has gone on we have found our own routine and style. We still attend many of the same groups with a few additions like piano lessons and a wonderful structured group run my our local organic farm. We tend to do less of our structured Sonlight stuff and more child led/Charlotte Mason type learning. This was mainly after I was finding that the things I had taught him because “that’s what we’re doing today” were being forgotten and the things they had initiated were staying in. It’s a lot harder for me doing it this way because I have to constantly be facilitating their questions and interests (Pinterest is a good friend of mine!) but so much more rewarding. We spend a lot of time outside exploring nature. I believe nature study is massively important. I am blessed with two boys who love nothing more than to be out digging for worms and searching for badger sets/rabbit warrens etc. 

I intend for us all (myself included) to keep nature journals. Michael is probably ready to start this soon, but it will be a while until Steven is ready. Nature Journals are a brilliant way of teaching children to really observe their surroundings in detail and feed the joy of nature and discovery.   It is also a brilliant way to keep them practicing their skills in recording, drawing/painting. We now spend a lot more time practicing drawing and painting. I want the boys to explore different media and really learn to love expressing themselves through art. Michael’s fine motor skills have been really improving since doing this more regularly and his painting skills (particularly in water colour) have seriously come on. This is a painting he did yesterday when observing the butterfly that emerged from its chrysalis after spending the whole winter in our observation net. It was feeding on the sweet juice of an orange.

We still read all the time and although we might not be following Sonlight so rigidly, we use their books a lot. They are generally really good "twaddle-free" books! Most days start with poetry. We have found it’s a truely lovely way to start the day and gets us all in the right frame of mind. I love ‘The Llama Who Had No Pajama’. Michael’s favourite poets are Michael Rosen and Spike Milligan at the moment. I don’t expect Charlotte Mason would entirely approve of that choice but I’m sure she’d be pleased this 6 year old has “a favourite poet”. At least once in the day we will sit down to read a short story or two. I particularly enjoy reading them a story from James Herriot’s ‘Treasury for Children’ as both boys find them captivating and the pictures are simply wonderful. While I read, the boys will do a quiet activity like Lego, threading, or plasticine (the current favourite). I have found that they will sit and listen for longer this way.

In the evenings I will read our chapter book to Michael (Steven is still too young to join in on this yet). Our current book is the unabridged version of Peter Pan.

Every Friday we have a “tea party Friday”. We bake something earlier in the day together and then all sit down with our best china (we bought specially for this and only get out on Fridays) and drink “chocolate tea” (which is what Steven calls hot chocolate!). There is something really special about the boys being allowed to use nice cups and saucers and pour *tea* out of a teapot themselves. During our tea party I read to them a book that we all agree on earlier in the day. Usually it’s a Beatrix Potter story or an Eye-View Library book (I completely recommend this series of books, they are brilliant!). We love our tea party Fridays, they are so special!

We are still following Singapore Maths. It’s a method that works well for both Michael and me.  It’s a really clear way of explaining how numbers work together and forms a really good foundation to build on. We also play a lot of games together. ‘Shut the box’ and ‘Your Number’s Up’ are still top favourites. We recently stayed with my parents and my Dad (a retired head teacher) did some basic algebra with Michael using our attributes pieces. We have continued this at home and I’ve been really pleased by how quickly Michael has picked up the concept.

I could jabber on for ages about what we’re up to, so rather than continue this now ridiculously long essay, I will save it in the hope I will write again soon! 

One year on

Today is exactly one year since we de-registered Michael from school and I wrote my first blog post.

WOW, what an amazing year we have had!!! It felt like such a scary step to take at the time and I in particular was sick with worry. “What if it’s a big mistake and we fail him”, “everyone will think we’re mad”, “he’ll never have any friends”!! It all seems so ludicrous now. It has been the best decision we have ever made! Our lives have changed massively and we don’t regret a single thing. We have had the privilege to watch our lost, angry, distracted and socially confused little boy grow and change into a confident, inquisitive, funny, and (most importantly!) happy bigger boy! Academically he’s come on so well (which has been so reassuring), but most amazingly (and much to our relief) he has made a ton of brilliant new friends! It seems to us that home educated children on the whole tend to take a child as they are and see new people as potential friends from the onset. 

It was Michael’s birthday in August, he is now 6. This year was the first year he had (because he wanted to) friends to come to a birthday party. This is such a big deal for us as in the past he has only every really had cousins to come and play. He chose to have a Toy Story themed party and had great fun.

The only negative I can think of that has come from becoming a home educating family is that I rarely get a break (hence the lack of blog posts!). It can be pretty full on as Michael is always on the go and I have to be at least three steps ahead. Think of the Tasmanian Devil crossed with Animal from the Muppets and you kind of get the idea!!! But the relaxed (almost holiday kind of feel) start to the day, all I have mentioned above and the joy I get from it well outweighs any negative.

We have become so much closer as a family this year. The boys adore each other and play really nicely together (most of the time!), they are rarely apart. Michael has so much more confidence and belief in himself now. He sees life as an adventure and we have so much fun. He is hilarious and brilliantly quirky! We are so very proud of him!

So I’ll finish up this soppy blog post by saying how pleased and excited we are that we made that step last year. Home education is brilliant!!!

Sprouting seeds

Like most people this time of year, we have been planting out seeds to grow some vegetables in our garden. 

We’ve talked before about “roots and shoots” etc and have watched time lapse videos but I wanted to be able to show him in a more hands on way.

We planted runner beans in cotton wool and clear plastic cups. 

Every day Michael watered them and observed their change. It worked really well. He could clearly see the beans, roots, shoots and leaves and was able to watch the order in which they appeared. He sat and drew them; this is the diagram he drew...

One bonus that we hadn’t expected was that one of the bean’s shoots couldn’t find its way up. We talked about how plants need sunshine and made a channel in the cotton wool to help it up. The shoot had taken too long however so it scrapped that shoot and sent up a new one. This was a brilliant example of nature solving problems for Michael to see!

We also sprouted mung beans and have enjoyed eating them in our wraps and meals.

London

My husband has been working on a project in London recently. Michael struggles with his absence and worries that he won’t come home. Even though he has been adopted for some time now, he still finds it hard to believe that “we will love him forever”. Often children who have been through the care system have these issues. It’s heart breaking! So we decided to take a trip down to London to see where Daddy was working, stay in his hotel and visit a few museums. It was brilliant!

We got up at 4:30am to catch the train. The boys were so excited! Michael tells everyone “we got up in the middle of the night and had breakfast on the train...in the night!!!” I love the way children see things.

We dropped our luggage at the hotel and then walked to where my husband was working. He builds television studios. Michael loved being able to have a good look and asked lots of questions. He loves to know how things work and why.

We then jumped on the tube (thank goodness for baby carriers!) and spent the whole day in the Science Museum! We had planned to visit a couple of museums that day but the boys both loved the Science Museum so much that we spent 7 hours there!  As I said before, Michael loves to know how things work and why so this museum ticked that box beautifully.  Steven particularly enjoyed the sensory garden as there was water play and things to bang!

We got the chance to sneak into a bubble show that was being run for a special school. Michael charmed the teachers into letting us in too. It was excellent.

We stayed one night. The second day was spent at the National History Museum and British Museum. The British Museum was a little too “do not touch” for my boys so we ended up chasing pigeons at the park instead.

The National History Museum however was great! We've been before, but that didn't seem to matter. Michael hired one of their explorer packs. It’s a backpack with clues inside (and cool binoculars and hat!), you have to work out what creature the clues are from and find it from somewhere within the museum. Michael had the “long-horned cowfish”.

It was a wonderful trip. It helped to ease Michael’s fear about whether Daddy was coming home, and gave us lots of learning opportunities. It was also a good opportunity for him to do a bit of train spotting; his favourite subject!!!