Home Schooling: The Epitome Of Eclectic Learning

No two days are alike when you home school three children at this amazing age where everything is an adventure and they find joy in any new exploration, whether it is found academically or outside in nature. The subjects may stay the same but the key is to keep the approach spontaneous and in the hands of the children if possible. Over the course of two days, surprising and magical events took place.

 In regards to the academic side of things the girls were practicing their mental maths, multiplying by two, five and ten, and adding in tens and ones at breakfast time, and providing alternative additions and subtraction variants to reach the number seven and nine, and then they spent some time on their current maths workbooks. Xander proudly showed his mental maths skills off answering 1+1, 1+2 and 2+2. Multiplying by three has a hit a mental block past the stage of twelve, despite verbal repetition and YouTube songs, so I think I need to get creative and make the three times table come alive more tangibly for them over the next few days. Time to rescue the number blocks from the stick house project and set to work.

Kira did several sessions of handwriting practice, staying with hand drawn wide lines, copying from various story books which took her fancy, and practicing spellings. I am just reaching the stage where I am training her to hold the pencil correctly, however it is merely for two words at this stage and then she can go back to holding the pencil in a comfortable manner whilst she’s concentrating on sizing and letter formation. Sophia was finishing her letter off to her penpal and practicing spellings from the og, ut, o, e, he, ig and ag word families. Xander was looking through sight words, practicing phonics and alphabet examples, and reciting his continents and planets.

Science was looking into what makes us alive, and the definition of habitats, they are getting good in placing animals in their natural habitats, and being able to describe what they eat. Now the terms carnivore, herbivore and omnivore has been learnt, next is the learning of the basic food chain. They are very good at linking previous knowledge learnt last year to current knowledge to build the bigger picture. Spanish practice was fun and cheerful using Jack Hartmann YouTube videos, and Xander is proving as much of a natural as his sisters for languages. He sings his little heart out without looking at the screen. They are all making headway with the alphabet, colours, days of the week and 1-20.

The theme to their art and crafts was birds, as we had an abundance of pigeon feathers. Sophia stuck a large green leaf down for a background and arranged the feathers as a flying bird. Kira created an ostrich out of leaves which she cut up for the legs and body, with a pom pom for a head. She then drew an amazing picture of a grumpy bird sat in a tree in a sunny day which blew me away, I was so impressed.

The girls went out individually with dad to spend some one and one time with him and they had such adventures! Kira visited the horses at the local farm and spent some time petting them. Sophia was hunting for natural materials for future craft sessions, and as a result of them taking their time and enjoying the nature around them, paying close attention to the verges in particular they made a magical discovery. There were roughly crafted steps leading down from the main path and there was a ‘beach’. It was a private area of stones and dirt on the water level, so the canal was accessible. Sophia had the opportunity to paddle her feet in water outside in a nature for the first time in her almost six years, and she loved it, standing barefoot in water skimming rocks, the epitome of childhood. She was bubbling over with excitement when she arrived home telling me about her great adventure. Kira went out with dad the next day to explore the beach too, much to her delight.