Monday 14 September 2009

Enjoying early Autumn days

We were busy bees last week, and covered lots of 'study areas'!

The 4 of us went to Ivinghoe Beacon, took biscuits and a flask, ran around a bit, rolled down the hill (well, I sat that out but Rob did his duty!) and enjoyed the air. Later we popped to the library and picked up loads of books on planes, dinosaurs and Meg and Mog. Freddie and I played a couple of games of dominos. A lovely relaxed day.

Carrie and Soli came over the next day so we took them to Wendover Woods for a play and picnic. It was a gorgeous September day, really warm and sunny.

Freddie and Rob spent a couple of hours at the allotment on Wednesday, digging up weeds and pruning raspberry canes. they also went scrumping for apples but had no luck! Freddie made up an odd-one-out game with his dinosaurs, and the kids played with playdoh for a while, making diono foot prints and dinner for everyone. Freddie and I did some baking and made trail mix bars. Really tasty.

As Granny's birthday was coming up we made her a card. Basically it was a glitter and glue fest, with a few stickers for good measure. Freddie also drew an allosaurus inside. He's not interested yet in signing his name, but the fact he's drawing in cards rather than doing random scribbles is a big change.

We met up with Rachel and Nicola at Ashridge. Freddie cycled and Betsy pushed her buggy, but predictibly I ended up carrying Betsy and her buggy, and trying to persuade Freddie to keep going on the bike! Thank goodness we had trail mix and other treats to help them along.

Friday was very busy. Rob and Betsy had a day together and Freddie and I went to the Natural History Museum. We met up with ourExperience Education friends to look at the mini beasts gallery and the butterfly exhibition. Fred was great on the train, even though it's a pretty long journey. After the exhibition he wanted to go to the Science Museum to the waterplay bit in the basement, then we got the train home. We were knackered, but after tea we all jumped in the car and drove to Rob's folks for the weekend. The kids had a good time as always.

This week is my meeting new home ed people week! Hope we enjoy it....

Friday 4 September 2009

'Reception' year starts

The summer holidays are at an end, and Freddie would have started in reception yesterday or today. We have carried on as normal, and it feels a little odd but we're all very happy!

We had a lovely week camping in Dorset last week, on a farm with hay bales, camp fires and so much space for the kids to run. We walked along the south coast path into Weymouth, met up with Kate and Tom (and baby Mo) in Glastonbury, went on a trip to Brownsea Island, poodled around the Sea Life Centre avoiding the rain showers, and got stuck in awful traffic on the way to Charmouth beach (but was worth it).

I'm going to try and keep rough track of what we get up to (in 'term time' at any rate) as a weekly log. It won't make fascinating reading but hopefully will help if (when) I have to produce evidence of learning activities.

So this week's main fun has included:

- playgroup
- lots of dinosaurs
- playing with the teepee
- lots of reading (volcanoes, dinosaurs, farms)
- mazes on the wipeaway cards
- cars making traffic jams etc
- shopping for food and essentials
- the Experience Education meeting (socialising with other home ed kids)
- Play day at Emma's
- Playing school (Freddie as 'school man' and me as the children. I have to draw what he asks and he marks me. I find this game really interesting as it's totally led by him but he hasn't really seen anything like this in action, so I'm not sure where he's picked it up from).
- Peeling carrots for tea
- Afternoon with some similar aged home ed kids, playing in the garden and making up games about an alien monster (naturally)