Class 5

Willow has a very interesting array of themes and topics to study this year.

We've done the first part of her geography block, and examined our state.



And we've done a large chunk of the ancient world. There are so many interesting ancient cultures- it was hard to choose. But in the end I decided that we would briefly look at Atlantis, Mu, Zealandia, the Mayans, and the Jamon culture, but our main focus was on Babylonia, Hatti and Ancient Persia. She put together a beautiful book. And she is also getting very good with her map drawing.

The exposure to varied languages and scripts very much appeals to me within this sort of education. Looking at cunieform and Persian and Chinese, so far this year, and later Greek and Egyptian- just seems to me to bring much richness to a child's education. To have a familiarity with the greater world- and to understand that there is more, than what we here have done, or are doing, seems to me to be an invaluable realisation.

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2025

So much of reading my take on what we were doing back then is a bit amusing, the "I decided....."  section does here.  By the time Arden was onto similar topics, it was much more we decided.  I still stuck with we are Steiner themed in our home education, but it was much more a theme, and an education than a school experience.  Willow's experience, and to a certain extent Gabriel's was more school like in the early years.  Funnily enough their high school experience was probably less school like than Arden's, who wanted to continue doing all the activities that Irving was doing too, for quite a bit of his high school education.

Food School

We have had such a busy term, that I have not done much blogging.

Gabriel has been doing food preparation, and maths, and a creation book.

There was much fun and mess!

Making butter using Gabriel's flavour shaker (or should I say Jamie Oliver's?) went down well. As well as our butter in a jar, made with a jar and marble. It was interesting to see that the flavour shaker made butter quite a bit quicker.

Flavour Shaker butter



Marble and Jar butter



Then there was the sauerkraut. Very simple to make- cabbage, caraway seeds and salt. Everybody got into making it. Willow and Arden included. We all sat in the backyard, and bashed and bashed the cabbage with our wooden spoons. It took a while, but eventually we had plenty of juice, and sauerkraut was left to ferment. And after making it once, I often have people offering to help, seems everyone loves to bash a cabbage!

Back to School

Wow- we've just had a week's holiday, and finished our first block for the year. There was so many interesting things to do that it would have been nice to spent more time on it. Willow's work was largely around Ancient India and Ancient China. We did loads of creative things relating to the two topics.



Gabriel did lots of star drawing, but in usual style wanted to try out Willow's work too.

Sewing is happening nicely- Willow is doing well on her shirt. And Gabriel and I are doing a great job at making him a kilt out of an old sheet. But really that's our practise run- soon we'll buy some nice kilt fabric and get going on the real one.

For the first time in my life (since leaving home) we have our own car in the driveway. It seems very odd, and looks like we're fitting into Adelaide life, except that we don't drive it much. My brother offered us the car, and I thought it was a good idea, as we've been meaning to do some journeying out of Adelaide. So after changing the registration, we had a cleaning day- my brother lives out bush so it was rather grubby! And decided to go for a drive. Trouble was it was good Friday, and we couldn't really think of anywhere to go. But on the Saturday we went out and had a look at the Farmers Market at Willunga. The Market there was amazing! Particularly the spices. It was a bit of a hike, but well worth the journey.

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2025

LOL, this is a funny reminiscence- I think at the end of the winter we gave the car back to my brother.  His new van had broken down, and I suspect he may have thought I'd drive more.  I didn't and don't like driving, so I never did drive that van.  These days Willow has her own car, and lives in the SW of Western Australia, so needs it even more then we do, and Arden is keen to get his L plates soon.

This is our instagram page for our car free living life- we haven't used it much recently.
https://www.instagram.com/carfreeliving/

Week 1

We've just started our school work for the year. It's so lovely to start in March rather than Jan/ Feb like the schools, since usually the worst of the heat has left for the year.

We had a lovely start- at present I'm telling some of the stories from the Ramayana and reading the Celtic Wonder Tales. We did a lot of form drawing and modelling, and learnt about the Swastika symbol and its roots in Hinduism, and Hindu's connection to the Aryans.

The craft is looking interesting so far too. Willow is handsewing a shirt, and Gabriel a kilt. We're having a practise run at the kilt, before we select fabric and start properly. I've been trying some handsewing too, so far I've made Gabriel some cords, and am in the process of making myself some pants too.

Thoughts on Boys and Girls

We've had a bit of a funny week really. Some odd stuff happening at home. And then we caught up with our homeschool group for the first time this year. So Gabriel came back from this last catch up, saying that he had no fun as all the boys are too aggressive. Funnily enough over lunch all the mums sat around nodding their heads about how 'boys are SOOOO different to girls'. I didn't say anything at the time as there was no need, but that has never been my experience.

However when we came home and Gabriel was saying that he had no fun. I felt that I needed to say something. It has opened up the discussion at least, and hopefully it can move to a positive space. My experience is that boys are usually more physical that girls, but that the aggression, is related to the tribal experience of Australians as well as television. It seems that many mothers are unable to address this, and are not able to encourage their boys through any aggression Instead it is just accepted that they have no control over the desire to hit, push, shove, and wrestle. In particular it concerns me that these children are role models to younger children, and that children younger than 7, primarily learn through imitation. Of course these older children have no idea, that they are being emulated, but I think as a society all older people need to be held more accountable for their actions. I suspect that if this happened with all children we'd be living in a much more stable society. I know that, for myself, I had no idea how important my behaviour was in shaping another person until we had my daughter.

What a different world it would be if people realised that the behaviour of each of us matters.

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2025

I still feel this way generally.  We now have more boys and each one is quite different to another, and in fact I was discussing with someone recently that if I only had certain combinations of my children, I could be going around saying "all children are motivated, driven and organised when it comes to achieving their goals around their interests and careers".  Now anyone can see that it is a blatantly ridiculous generalisation, but at this stage I definitely have two children that are more that direction.

Equally I have two that are more dreamy.  And I could make generalisations that way, if I only had those two.  So I just steer clear of generalisations myself.  I hated them growing up, I wanted to be seen for me, and how I do things and not for being a "girl" and so I treat my children as I wished to be treated, as unique individuals with their own goals and interests to be nurtured and expressed.

In general we've still found my above complaints to be an issue here, and overall they've affected us somewhat as a family.  The culture is always in a hurry and has little time for attention to children, and that definitely affects how the children behave.  We've adapted to this aspect of the culture, and accepted the deficits and the assets it brings- because that is one aspect that I  have probably matured in living here, is that there are pros and cons to everything.

Summer Holidays

So we're still having our Summer break- school has gone back, but in our home, I'm totally anti organised work when there's a possibility of a heat wave. So we're all enjoying hanging out together. And despite the lack of daily planned activities we still seem to be busy!

Over January Willow and Gabriel had swimming lessons down the beach- as we do every summer, and as usual it was lovely. Early morning swim, and hanging out at the beach is very relaxing.

Willow had her 10th birthday- an Alice in Wonderland themed party which she enjoyed immensely. She did lots of the planning and cooking, and all was wonderful. I made a rose syrup heart shaped cake for her. Since Gabriel is currently avoiding grains, the cake was made with nut meal and coconut flour. It was very tasty and looked lovely covered in raspberries.


Plus there was my birthday, and my home made cake this year.





I am currently making my plans for class 5 and 3. Amazing how far we are through! Willow and Gabriel both received pocket knives to learn whittling this year. Both were very pleased to receive them....now we just need to remember to get them engraved. I've been reading we need to really start on greenwood, so am wondering a bit about that...will have to look into what types of woods are best in Australia. All of this is a bit new to me too! Gabriel wants to hand sew a kilt, as his sewing project, which I must admit sounds very challenging. But since he's enthused for the idea, I'm willing to give it a try. And I'm planning to use the Bible and the Celtic Wonder Tales as his texts this year.

Finally we'll be in the Fringe Parade again, though this time all of us. I've organised for some of us local homeschoolers to go in it. It's been quite a bit of work, but it's all starting to come together, and all the costumes and the float look fabulous. I think the day is going to be lots of FUN!

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2025

Funny reviewing this and thinking back on what we did and didn't manage to do.  We did experiment a bit with the woodwork, but we didn't have enough people in our circle at that time to guide with our inexperience, and we hadn't gotten into the idea of youtube as a learning tool yet.  My Dad would have been a great help for woodwork, but he'd died many years before.  On moving to Perth we found great woodwork lessons with Joy of Wood, and Irving and I currently take private lessons there, with another homeschool friend.

Some of our projects from last year are on this post.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2024/11/first-half-of-year.html

Some of Arden and Gabriel's woodwork.
https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2015/10/woodwork.html

Willow, Gabriel and my step stools.
https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2012/12/recent-activities.html

Plus Arden trying out the saw horse.

https://unicorn-pegasus.blogspot.com/2019/10/term-3.html

Sewing wise, I was still in my early days of improving handskills- I did have more experience in that area- but mostly in pattern layout and cutting, as my Dad always helped my mum with these things, and he (almost) always encourage me to watch and learn.  The kilt pattern we found was a bit beyond my skill level at that time, and none of our home ed circle had sewing skills.

2010

Hi all,and happy new year!
rite now me and Gabriel have been doing swimming lessens at the Beach,got our- self sun burnt,nearly caught some fish(in a bucket and with our hands).
Gabriel got a loft bed,I got a lamp & a table, and Annmarie & Damien got a new washing machine (about 4 days ago).
not much more to say,willowunicorn