A Learning Experience to Remember: August 2021-August 2022

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 tabl...

This has been a great weekend: with lots of family time, hours of garden time, and two nature walks. They loved showing off their woodland spoils to their friend next door. There's been an extraordinary number of bubble baths due to them coming in from the garden absolutely filthy from top to toe, and they filled a washing basket just between them! As our learning journey moves forward constantly and weekends are not traditionally recognised, there was plenty of home educating to counterbalance the outdoor adventures.  We woke up our sleepy brains with a good Spanish session which all three children are loving and picking up fast. This morning we had several renditions of Jack Hartmann musical educational videos on colours and alphabet. We sang 1-100, and looked at days of the week for the first time. I also sang a Spanish song about colours to them which I am sure they will learn quickly, if only to stop mum singing it to them. Breakfast time approached and as they sit round the f...

This particular day started at 4.30am, with Xander marching round the bed chanting the alphabet. I stumbled downstairs and my personal educational journey commenced at this ridiculous time in the morning as I quickly realised that Xanders stomach tube had broken, so his morning meds were hitting the floor rather than his stomach. I replaced the peg end for the first time ever by myself whilst half asleep and it worked! Medicines and feeds could once again commence. Where's the coffee!  The English session consisted of Kira finishing of her Farm animal reading book and reading the entire of Shirley Hughes 'Sally's Secrets', aimed at an aged five reader. We finished reading and discussing the horse project book and watched some show jumping on YouTube. Sophia later wrote a few sentences dictated to her, incorporating a mix of common words, basic punctuation, and words from the 'At', 'It', 'Ow', 'In', 'On' and 'En' families. ...

Greetings dear readers, I cannot recommend learning spelling via the word family method enough, it is really working well with Sophia who struggles with retaining spellings more than a few moments after she's told you. I dictated a couple of sentences to her using a mix of common words and words from the 'At', 'Ow' and 'It' families, as well as basic punctuation. She could use the tools she's learnt so far with a mix of phonics and word families to write it out for me, just needing the odd reminder on spacing. She was so excited when she saw the finished article and proudly read it back to me.  They wanted educational play lists on then, and Spanish was the consensus. Jack Hartmann has a really good, fun, catchy video on Spanish Colours which is a family favourite. Xander recognised the language and started telling us 1-7 in Spanish unexpectedly, toddlers are such sponges, they really do take in far more from their surroundings then we realise. He also r...

  I am relieved to report that nothing disastrous has occurred during this traditionally superstitious day. We also had a lie in till 6am, which really makes all the difference.  The girls were hot off the press this morning, straight after their pre breakfast snack of milk and salmon, they were clamouring to continue the farm project. Kira wanted to re watch the video on hay making, and Sophia was fascinated to watch the process of milking a cow. Both girls preferred seeing hand milking by a farmers wife and asked a lot of questions. The milking machine scared them a little, they were not convinced it wouldn't upset the cows. Sophia was also keen to see an angry bull in action, and Kira was fascinated to learn that there is an even more powerful breed than the bull...oxen.  We are hurtling through this first book, it will be finished by Sunday, which lines up nicely to start book two next week. I am reviewing daily with them and they are eagerly retaining the information...

The day started at 5am and as I stumbled down the stairs after an energetic Xander, the girls met me with their first weird and wonderful questions of the day.  Sophia had found a sprig of rosemary lying around that Dad had found foraging and wanted to know all about the herb. I made my way down to the kitchen to sort out the first of the many meds for Xander, Kira sought me out and we had an in depth conversation about how snakes kill their prey.  Ever since I first had Sophia I remember being warned 'just wait till you reach the questions stage', but I personally love it and take them in my stride, answering them around whatever I happen to be doing at the time. I really recommend you to embrace this question phase, they're not an annoyance, but an opportunity for a quick five minute snapshot lesson, which can sometimes extend into an entire topic. Try and analyse their questions as they can give you insight into the children's interests, and inspire full projects.  T...