2014

We've recently had our annual review, which as usual I'm pleased is done, and we've pretty much finished our work for this year- Willow and Gabriel are just finishing off a few extra things. It's been very hectic chasing around our almost 18month old Irving, and doing yr 9, yr 7 and yr 1, but there's been lots of lovely work done and some really enjoyable events this year.

So after a very hectic term and year we are finally finished.

Arden finished his first knitting project earlier in the year.  A purse for his doll.  It was knitted with pure wool and then wet felted, and finished with a button.  We didn't really need to wet felt it, as Arden's knitting was very beautiful.  Often little people make a few mistakes here and there, and the wet felting helps to finish it off nicely.

Arden has been working at his cursive and print this year, with the focus on cursive.

 

I've been learning to write right handed at the same time!  The top is left, the bottom right.

 

Arden has been very lucky to go busking with some friends of ours this year.  He's been loving busking the harmonica, and has been experimenting with lots of instruments.

Gabriel finished knitting his socks.  He's become adept at following the patterns and has finally really settled into knitting well.

Willow finished her doll off finally.  She's being well loved by Irving :)

 

And she finished her weaving project: a small blanket!

She was lucky to get an opportunity to make a harp.

She also got to attend a recording session of voice overs, and get an idea of what it's like to be a voice actor.  She's also joined the Gilbert and Sullivan society with her Dad, Damien, which she is loving.  She's really enjoying getting to perform and sing on the stage again.

There has been a lot of interesting excursions and activities this year and particularly this term.  We've been to Herdsman Lake and the Literature Centre and learnt about beekeeping.  We've done lots of circus, jujutsu, basketball and dancing.  We've been to the ballet a few times (last performance is this week) and we won an incursion to the balllet (thanks ballet WA :) !) where we discovered that ballet originates from fencing! Not surprising when one thinks about it.

Anyway it's been a very full and interesting year.  With everyone progressing along nicely, and lots of fun and work along the way!

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2025

I've continued learning to be right handed, and my writing is now reasonable albeit slow.  It seems to have had the positive affect of improving my left handed writing too I think.  I never liked my left- handed "cursive" as it was a weird mess of real cursive and "linked up letters" as the Government/school called what they introduced to us.  For some reason instead of letting us finish off cursive, since we'd already started it, they had to change everyone over to the new system, at the same time.  I've been quite purposeful with my right hand, in trying to develop an attractive cursive style, and I think this is starting to blend over to me other side, which I did not expect.

Also the above is a good illustration of the silly way schools teach things.  Implementing with poor timing, and changing things because it would be easier for some, of course we can dumb everything down, but then the children who would thrive with the challenge of something more difficult are ignored then too.  The only people who are really served in this system are those that are in the middle, "average", and how many kids really fit that mould?

This is how cursive  was mostly likely removed as the main way we teach writing ( more on cursive here).  Which seems to have progressed to beginning with printing, and then moving to cursive, and now there are people that wonder why we need to write at all.  Sadly they are completely ignorant of the fact that doing complex finger based activities and developing dexterity strengthens the brain, and learning to write is as much about that as it is about the writing itself.

Alternatively much is done for the convenience of the teacher, because TBH it is a challenge to manage children.  They are in various levels of "asleep" mode compared to an adult, and so getting them to learn in  structured group is not natural to their current mode of being.  I share some links in this post about children's brainwaves.
https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2025/01/beginnings-and-endings-and-thoughts-on.html

We had a few fun filled years in the Gilbert and Sullivan society, whilst Willow was on her journey to getting into WAAPA.

Pirates of Penzance performance can be found here.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2015/05/pirates-of-penzance.html

Iolanthe can be found here.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2016/06/iolanthe-has-take-over.html

She still has her harp; it was another one of those excellent one off learning opportunities that we came across over the years.  Since Irving was very young, she did the class independantly, and managed most of the work herself, with some minor assistance.