Class Dismissed

This film looks like it will be interesting, for anyone wanting to learn more about homeschooling.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FMrQXkFCxA&list=UUYrw3PQxFMA_iwPA8AFlkrw

Change

It's been a time of change around here, so hopefully it will all lead to somewhere good.  Damien  was made redundant and has also  started a new job. Plus Willow's volunteering at City Farm has come to an end, but it does look as if there may be alternative opportunities for her in that realm. 

Damien took Arden to see "Room on the Broom" at the Heath Ledger Centre.  Arden was a bit worried about the dragon in it being too scary, but he was pleasantly surprised when he went to see it.  When Willow and Gabriel were about Arden's age, I used to almost be able to recite the book off by heart, everyone loved it so much.  Arden though prefers some of the other Julia Donaldson books, like Tiddler, Tabby MacTat and Monkey Puzzle. 

Waiting for the performance to start.



Gabriel has been working on his next block this week- part two of ancient Rome, Willow is on to geography and Arden has been working on vowels, and how they are the fillings that help us make words.  We've also started reading 'The Boy Apprenticed to an Enchanter'.

Gabriel also did a little more drawing of zebras this week, after having a solid few weeks of modelling them- we will be looking at pattern planning in the next week or so.

Willow has been back on to doing some beautiful geometric drawings, which I've forgotten to photograph this week (and being stuck under Irving I can't do it now) and Gabriel has been working on the King's and Queen's crowns and cardiodes.  Arden's been getting involved in geometry as usual too.






 

And cardiodes- Gabriel's followed by Arden's.

Arden was the recipient of some left overs from a local cafe last week- which he was very happy about - here are some of the bits he received.

And finally this is one of the mosaics that Willow had been working on during her time volunteering.

Terrarium

Willow made this terrarium at City Farm, when she was helping out there.

Back to School

So our 6 week break is over, and we started school again this week.  It was great to get back into organised activities at home, and so much of the work was interesting.  I've decided next year, that we'll have a 2 1/2 month summer break and start mid February, as having the longer break in the middle has gotten us all rejuvenated for the second half of the year.  So we'll be looking at a 4 week break next winter.

Gabriel was continuing on with his English block we started last term, and this week we were looking at sentence structures, whilst continuing with reading "Beowulf" and Padraic Colum's King Arthur stories. 

We looked at a pictorial proof in geometry this week.

My version.

Gabriel's version.

Gabriel has progressed onto modellling for his craft project, and is currently modelling zebras, before he will eventually move onto planning his project.

Arden and I continued working through the alphabet this week, looking at the letters L and Z.  Next week we'll do a mix of activities, before moving onto the vowels.

Here's our modelling.

 

And our painting for the week.


This is my lamp painting.


Arden's lamp painting.


Willow is onto working on her computing block.  Damien is taking her through the basics of hardware, and she's teaching herself touch typing using Ktype and tux type.  (Damien works in IT and we have linux as our operating system at home.)

I bought a few new books recently: "The Little Prince" and also "Between Form and Freedom" and also "The Nourishing Traditions Book of Baby and Child Care."  We've all been enjoying "The Little Prince", and it's been our lunch time read for the week.  Arden is particularly enjoying it.  I wasn't sure how much I'd like "Between Form and Freedom" as I'd come to realise quite some time ago that homeschooled teenagers are different from schooled ones, waldorf or not.  Generally this book is a schooled child's book and not a home educated child's book.  There are bits I'm finding really annoying, but there are a few good bits in there too.  The last book I haven't had much of a chance to look at properly yet, but I cut out all pasteurised dairy, after reading that this can cause some babies discomfort when breastfeeding, and Irving is certainly cheerier now.  I wasn't having a lot of pasteurised dairy (milk and cream at home are raw) but now I'm pretty much sticking to raw.