Different Maths

From time to time the media report a decline in standards, or state that exams are getting easier etc, and there are some who agree and others who refute this every time. I can't comment on that, but I am finding that the modern maths curriculum for keystage 3 is different from what I experienced in my school days.
For a start I don't recall needing a scientific calculator as early as year 7. I'm pretty sure we still had to use primarily mental calculation at that stage. Also I'm sure I did not cover some of the topics the boys are now working on through Conquer Maths, for example statistics. In today's lesson the "sigma" symbol came up (I don't know how to keyboard that!). I don't remember that symbol at all, or other terms used in this topic. I can remember mean and mode, but that's about it! I don't think its just my memory failing, even if I can't remember much about something the keywords will usually jog some distant memory. I think statistics wasn't on the curriculum I followed.
I'm not too worried however! The wonderful ConquerMaths explains it all excellently, so the boys don't often need my less than helpful input on this subject! They work independently through the lessons, alhamdulillah, but if I'm called upon for back up I just watch the lesson myself and take it from there. Sometimes the methods differ from what I learnt at school. I'm pretty clear when it comes to working with percentages for example, but I found my methods were not the same as those on the programme, although I was still getting the same answers (phew).
One thing I'm glad about though is that I followed a maths curriculum through the primary years and built up the boys basic skills and maths knowledge, at a stage when it was all familiar and easy for me too! I think that it is because they have that behind them, alhamdulillah, that they are ready to take on the Conquer Maths independently. The programme does take for granted that you know the basics.
The way I see it the primary maths curriculum is a direct preparation for secondary maths, in a way which does not hold true with most other subjects.
With maths in the primary years I was always (and still am with the girls) plodding and methodical, sometimes repetitive, as the curriculum was just a bit like that. At the time the boys did not like maths too much, but now it has paid off in my opinion, as they enjoy it much more now. Maybe its a bit like learning a foreign language. When you plod through lots of vocab lists and basic sentences it can feel quite dull, but once you can actually speak the language and find yourself really using it, it is so much more enjoyable.
For me having the boys ready to take on unfamiliar maths topics independently through Conquer Maths, means that secondary maths is "doable" at home, even for me as a non-maths person and with a very different looking curriculum. Alhamdulillah.

Still here!

Long time no post!
Well, we are still here, still home educating alhamdulillah. We are in the winter work mode, so ploughing on with the basics while outdoor opportunities are scarce.
It has been kind of "no frills" around here lately, but, inshAllah lots of learning still goes on and no one is complaining, maashAllah.

Curriculum choices

Umm Ahmad requested that I describe my curriculum choices, so I'll post a little about that today, inshAllah.

I don't follow any particular methodology or approach. In fact, I'd say I'm pretty conventional about the way I home ed, but I don't stick to any ideology. I don't think it is necessary to stick to any one curriculum until you are actually preparing an exam syllabus. I use the National Curriculum as a reference spine for some subjects, but not at all for others. I do not attempt to apply the whole National Curriculum. No way. Avoiding the limitations of the National Curriculum is an advantage of home education.
With my daughters, while they are under 7/year 3 I have focussed mainly on English and maths, with other subjects done on a topic basis. This means that I don't teach separate science or geography, for example, but these things are covered through projects or practical learning. Of course there is Islamic studies too, but again I cover this in a topic/project way. Only from year 3 do I start to make separate sessions for the different subject areas and think more carefully about what is covered under each subject heading.

So, with that in mind I'll run through some of the resources I'm using with my girls this year.

First the 5 year old. For English we are using Literacy Now age 5-6 (Andrew Brodie). I like this worbook, it has just enough to do, but its range is quite spread, from easy at the beginning to quite a bit harder at the end. For this reason I don't use it continuously, I use each double page unit as I feel that U becomes ready for it. So I might use this book several times in one week, then not again for a month.

We've also finished off Schofield and Sims First Phonics4, which deals with blends in a clear straightforward way. Then there is Bond No Nonsense 5-6 years. This again I use a sprinkling of, not too often, in this case because it is so boring. I see the virtue of this book, but it has the National Curriculum drill them to death mentality about it. As it says on the back it is for children who want to do better. Better in National Tests I presume, through endless repetitive practice.

I also have the Letts Literacy Activity Books for Year 1, which I intend to start using sometime during the next couple of months, inshAllah. I also hope to get on to some story book lapbooks, as I did these with Ia when she was in year 1. U is a springtime baby,and so a little younger for her year group. At this stage I think the months still count, so I'm delaying these things until she maybe more ready for them, inshAllah.

She also does some handwriting practice, and reads from the Peter and Jane series

For maths I'm using some Collins Primary Maths workbooks, and the very old SPMG workbooks which I'm not sure can be purchased any more. she also has accounts on Mathletics and Education City.

Everything else is topic based and chosen randomly. Plus there is reading library books and practical things like art and baking done here and there, but not in a sheduled way. I don't use any other specific resources, just whatever is helpful for a particular topic. U is also now going for Quran lessons with a teacher, alhamdulillah.

With the 7 year old I use Collins Primary Maths (the version has just gone out of print), plus Mathletics and Education city. Maths is the one area that I stick with a curriculum carefully. I think that it helps to keep to one style with maths, as soon as you find the right one, as different systems teach different approaches. I found Collins suitable for us up to year 5, so I'm sticking with it, inshAllah.
For English I'm using Collins Focus on Literacy, (can't locate on Amazon just now) along with Nelson Thornes spelling and handwriting and Spellodrome, which comes with Mathletics. I continue to read aloud to the girls, as this is part of their language learning too, in my opinion.
For science I'm using year 3 National Curriculum topics, together with the CGP topic workbooks on those topics. For the two topics we've covered so far I tried to make it more interesting with a lapbook or practical activities. I'm not worried about covering everything, it is more important I think to cover a selection of topics in an enjoyable way, inshAllah.
For geography we have started working on the Trail Guide to World Geography. There is really no rush here. We'll go at a nice, comfortable pace, inshAllah, and do as many or as few notebookpages at each desination as we feel like.
For Islamic Studies I'm using Iqra workbooks on the life of the Prophet Muhammad (saw) and also doing notebook style work on the other Prophets (as), in order. We are still on Hud (as)! I may do a lapbook approach for some history of the Prophets. With the boys I varied the approach with each Prophet's story, and the whole thing took up to year 5.
Ia also has Quran lessons and does a bit of art most weeks, plus reading of course. Sometimes she does a little French on the computer.
I wonder if I've missed anything? If not, then that's about it, inshAllah.
So, I suppose in general I just try to find resources which seem to suit for each subject are, then I just work with them until I'm no longer satisfied, then I'll look for something else.

These days

These days as we plod along with our usual book work, the children have been coming up with other things they are interested in doing too. R made some chocolate bread with a receipe he found in one of my baking books. it is basically a white bread dough enriched with a little butter,a spoonful of sugar and some cocoa powder. Finally a chopped up chocolate bar is kneaded in just before it does into the tin to rise. I've been training R in ordinary breadmaking, so he could knead this one successfully himself, maashAllah. It turned out well, alhamdulillah. It looks like cake, but does not taste like cake, it is much less sweet and has that slight sourness of yeast. It was lovelywith some poured cream, maashAllah.
U has suddenly taken an interest in art,maashAllah and has been selecting projects from one of our "make and do" books. She has also added "rt" (art) to her task list, as well as "bak", which means "I must make jam tarts now". This did not happen yesterday as the girls went swimming instead. You can't get everything in a day!
However the art has been going on for the last couple of mornings. Some results below.

Hajj Project

I'm currently working on a little Hajj project with Ia (and sort of also with U). I had lots of thoughts about this and kept changing my mind about what to do. First Iconsidered some kind of wall display, then a lapbook, until finally I ended up with a notebook!
I still have some copies of Islamic theme colouring sheets I got from a sister some years ago which I have used from time to time in lapbooks. I don't know exactly where they came from originally, so I can't link you in their direction.
There are quite a few sheets related to Hajj and I wanted to utilise them this year. When teaching about Hajj I'm not too concerned about the child remembering all the sequence of what happens on which day and the route the pilgrims take. I think this is a lot to remember, and it is more important at this stage that the child knows something about what is done on Hajj in general and the background to it in order to get a feel for its importance, inshAllah.
So I'm taking one colouring sheet scene at a time, talking about what is depicted, looking into whatever background I can then writing a sentence or more on thebottom or back of the sheet.
For example, when we did the sheet on the Talbiyah I found a YouTube audio for us to listen to and after that Ia wrote out its translation. When doing the sheet on the sa'y (running between the hills of Safa and Marwa) I read the story of Hajar, the wife of Ibrahim (as) from the Quran Stories for Kids book and then asked Ia to write about those events in her own words.
There are also lots of opportunities to look at pictures online of the various significant locations visited on Hajj. If I did not have these colouring sheets I would probably print off some of those pictures and use them for visuals. I might also encourage Ia to draw her own pictures, maybe using some basic notebooking pages.
We still have plenty of sheets to go through in this project, inshAllah, including,
drinking Zamzam water,
the Day of Sacrifice
throwing the stones,
standing at Arafat, and others.
I am actually trying to use them in the order in which events occur but I like the way the sheets have caused me to focus on one element at a time and have kept me away from trying to fit the whole thing around a sequence or order of events as I think it would have been less interesting for Ia that way.

How the textbook helps

Not all children are going to enjoy textbook learning, but the textbook doesn't have to be just for the children!
Recently I bought a geography textbook to use with the boys. The first topic that we are covering is a chapter on volcanoes, earthquakes and tropical storms. Part of the chapter addresses the impact of these events on human populations, how people prepare for and manage their response when events like this happen.When I heard about the supertyphoon Megi hitting the Phillipines I got the boys to go onto news websites and read the reports.
As I read the page myself I realised how the description of the Phillipino disater management effort was such a good illustration of the issues the textbook had described. As a result of looking through the textbook I was able to start a discussion with the boys and get them to understand the difference between advance preparedness in case of disaster, and emergency response at the time through the examples given in one short news report.
I have to admit that without having read that textbook through previously I would not have thought to analyse the event in this way. I would have mainly focussed on the physical geography, the phenomenon of the storm itself and the material damage it may have caused.
So, that was how the textbook helped.

More...

These are U's cinnamon cookies. Of course she needed lots of help, but she feels like she made these all by herself, maashAllah.

In response to Umm Ahmad's request for the receipe for Ia's shortbreads:

Make a batch of plain shortbread dough, and a batch of chocolate shortbread dough.

Plain:

125g butter

50g sugar

175g plain flour

3 tablespoonsmilk.

Combine the dry ingredients in a bowl then rub in the butter until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Mix in the milk and form the dough into a firm ball using your hands.

To make the chocolate dough, follow the same procedure substituting 15g cocoa powder for 15g of the flour.

Cut each dough ball into three equal pieces.

To make the spiral shapes roll out a chocolate doughball into a square, then roll out a plain dough ball to the same shape. Place one on top of the other and roll them up together into a sausage shape. Then cut the roll into slices.

To make the squares shapes make dough into cuboids, two of each colour. Lay them side by side and on top of each other to make a block. Slice.

A third shape can be made with a sausage of plain dough wrapped up with a chocolate piece, like wrapping a gift. Then slice.

Bake for 15-25mins at 350F/180C/Gas4

Anyone who doesn't like baking will have surely left this blog by now!!!

Another bake!

This time it was Ia's turn to bake and she chose to make some biscuits maashAllah. I needed to help a little here and there, but mostly she could do it herself, especially as she used a receipe from a kid's cookery book.

The plan is that U will get her turn next, inshAllah, and then it will be back to R's turn again. I'm not sheduling which days to do this on, I'm just going to fit it in wherever I can. Ia decided to bake at 7:30pm yesterday, but as I was making a pie and some bread anyway I thought she might as well, even though it did make bed time a little later than usual.

Food Groups Lapbook

We have slowed down a lot with the lapbooks! There seems to be much more to do this year and I find myself having less time to devise my own projects unfortunately. U is working on a lapbook but she makes the mini books occasionally, so I don't know when we'll complete that!
This is Ia's first lapbook of this year. A simple food groups project.


She made mini books for protein, carbohydrates and sweet and fatty foods.
I printed out a food pyramid fact sheet to stick in the middle.

To make the sections on fruit and vegetables and dairy I printed off coloring sheets, so the information is immediate and visual.

You can find colouring sheets on almost anything these days!

To consolidate this topic I hope to do a food group treasure hunt in the kitchen, inshAllah. (You know, hunt for as many protein foods as you can find and bring them to the table)!

Make or Bake II

This time it was J's turn to make or bake and he chose to make buns. When I make buns I do not follow the receipe exactly, so I needed to stay nearby to tell him what to do. He also needed help with the kneading. His kneading was a little slow, so the dough got cool and did not rise as well as it should. They tasted fine though, maashAllah. (We don't ice buns, the kids prefer them not to be sticky.)

Make or Bake

As the autumal days of rain, rain, rain are keeping us in I thought of giving the children a make and bake challenge. R went first. (I can't have everyone making or baking on the same day...we wouldn't be able to eat it all.)
The challenge is to choose a receipe from our cookery books, then make it with as little supervision from me as possible. (I did supervise the frying!)
R chose doughnuts. I've never tried to make these before so I couldn't advise much. They turned out very well, maashAllah, and tasted just right, depite their irregular shapes! You can see the texture inside was as it should be. There was jam, just not in this photo!
Actually J said he'd prefer them without jam and sugar. Maybe he'd prefer Chinese doughnuts.

These doughnuts are no more! As R commented, you do feel fat afterwards!!!!

Testing Gases

Yesterday we did the tests for three invisible gases, hydrogen, carbon dioxide and oxygen. Earlier in the week the boys had studied a chapter on this in their textbook. We also all viewed this demonstration on YouTube. (Video has background music)
Above we are testing for oxygen. We used a wooden skewer to show the oxygen relighting the flame.
Below is the test for carbon dioxide using limewater. Our chemistry set has limited equipment, so improvisation with a drinking staw was required!
I also demonstrated the presence of cabon dioxide in exhaled breath by blowing into some limewater through a straw.

I don't have a photo of the test for the test hydrogen, but we did the experiment quite a few times and got several "pop"s.We found that you need to be pretty quick getting the flame into the hydrogen to get a pop.
Below is another test for carbon dioxide we watched here.
The carbon dioxide is being made by a reaction between vinegar and baking powder. You pour the foam around, but NOT ON the lighted candle.


As more is poured in the candle dims,

then it goes out, because of the carbon dioxide now in the jar.

today, inshAllah they'll be writing up.

Food Groups

Ia is learning about food groups at the moment. The way I'm organising things this year means that she does a science topic session a couple of times a week. She is using a CGP topic workbook on Teeth and Eating. She actually really enjoys this workbook. The questions are kept pretty easy, there is not too much on any one page, yet the core facts for the topic are in place. The workbook functions as the base for the topic, but by itself it is too brief to allow for much retention or absorbtion of information.
I'm not too good at detailed planning ahead. I find that the pressure of "need it now" helps me come up with ideas. No pressure,and I could sit for ages unproductively mulling over possible activities to do. So, as we go along with this topic I think of what to add in.
Yesterday Ia used a couple of websites to help her learn about food groups:
BBC bitesize
and Crick Web's Healthy Eating activity.
Now she is old enough to read the text and any instructions herself it is a big help, maashAllah. I just have to find the pages, add them to the favourites links, then she can follow them up herself.
I think that food groups might make a good lapbook topic, nice andvisual.... maybe that will be our next diversion, inshAllah.

Clay art

Today I took the girls to an art workshop. The theme was clay sculptures. The artist leading the session had made a bird as an example, as well as a couple of pots. I explained that we Muslims do not make sculptures of birds and animals and so we had a go at other things instead.
We were using air drying clay and then natural things such as seeds, twigs, leaves and dried flower things. Easy to copy at home! Lovely and autumnal too.
In the photo above there is a tree stump, a nest a hazelnut and a cupcake!
Below are two pots, a tree stump and a nest. U enjoyed this session, maashAllah, this was the first art session she was enthusiastic about throughout!

On the table

Our table seems to be constantly loaded with stuff. As soon as I clear a space it fills up again. At the moment Hama beads are very popular with the girls. They like to take out all the designs they have made as well as the beads for working on. Then they work on their new design little by little through the day.

Other stuff on the tables would include piles of library books, sticker books, pencil crayons, various workbooks, not to mention H's work files which take their turn in the mix.

Somehow we squeeze the space to work and eat on there as well, alhamdulillah!

Science at KS3

The three school years from age 11-14 are called keystage three in the UK. Keystage three is a strange place to be. It is a kind of waiting area.
For science at KS3I have bought Galore Park's So You really Want to Learn Science book 2.It states that it completes the course for KS3. It is quite a thick textbook, divided into colour coded sections on each of biology, chemistry and physics. Many of the topics repeat and extend what we did in book 1, and I'm pretty sure the same stuff will come up all over again at GCSE level. This makes KS3 either a time of going through the motions while waiting for a GCSE course to begin, or a time to explore in ways that are off curriculum.
Obviously the school going child has no choice in this matter, but home educators do!
This year's science for us, therefore, is going to focus on chemistry, using the book as a base, but hopefully, inshAllah, exploring chemistry generally as much as we can.
Here are some places that might be worth exploring on the way.

Shrinkles

Today we tried out Shrinkles. I got a box of these for the girls as an Eid gift. They coloured the whole lot, then we watched them curl and flatten in the oven, until they came out shrunk and hardened up.

Does anyone else remember shrinking crisp (chip) packets in the oven when they were younger? I wonder whether the packets are made of the same materials now - or would I end up coating the oven tray with a sticky mess?

Quran half hour

As the children grow and change so I keep needing to adapt and change what we do. Also, a bit of a change and variety does us good.
This year I really want to do Quran for about half an hour in the morning and resist the temptation to do read aloud first after that. This would work better really, but it is hard to discipline oneself into not doing the easier option! But more productive is better than easier, plus it makes for a less stressful rest of day!
For the Quran half hour the boys don't just recite. They recite, review the surahs they know, read through duas with the intention of learning them and from this morning I'd liketo get them working on AyatulKursi. They don't find memorisation easy, so the effort is important.
I found this excellent tool for helping to learn Ayatulkursi.
In her half hour Ia can review her Quran reading lesson, review the words for salaah, read duas and review the last ten surahs in Juz 30, using the computer programme. U can listen along and do a little work on recognising the Arabic letters, inshAllah.
Today we got this done in the morning, first thing and it was better that way, alhamdulillah.
Nothing we do is ever fixed permanently in one style, method or time. Change keeps things fresh and is necessary to meet our changing needs.

Back

Eid Mubarak! May our deeds of Ramadan be accepted.
Time to get back in the HE mood! But of course little bits of learning go on all the time, like when the girls decided to weigh some kitchen items!

Ramadan Lapbooking links

The girls finally finished the Ramadan lapbooks which they began many weeks ago! I don't know where they got the idea to colour the cover picture as they did! I find that my children just like to colour things brightly, rather than trying to use more realistic colours.
Inside the lapbook, as I mentioned before I used a compilation of ideas from other sisters. I thought I should mention those locations again as maybe someone out there would be looking for something like this to do with their child in the remainder of Ramadan, inshAllah.
The Raising Muslims blog is an excellent Ramadan lapbook resource.
My friend UmmK made the one at Always Learning Resources
and for many more Islamic Lapbooks on various topics you should go look at Islamic Lapbooking
where you can find 12 examples of Ramadan lapbooks, or lapbook resources, maashAllah.
Its not too late to have a go at something!

With glitter

Yesterday evening U decided that she wanted to make a glitterymobile that she had found in one of our "things to make" books. Well, glitter just gets everywhere doesn't it? Even in the eyelashes, which I do find worrying because it would be horrible to get a bit in the eye. But as the glitter had already come out this pushed me to get the girls making their Ramadan calendars this morning. (I only wanted to clear up once!)
Every year now we seem to be making a glittery calendar. At first there was more of a moon theme to the decorations, but this year it seems to be more about glitter than anything else! Ia had a go at a crescent shape, amidst all the rest! We stick the calendars on the wall, and they cross off the days as we go through the month, inshAllah. (There are boxes with the numbers 1 to 30 at the bottom, bit hard to see in the photo.)

Fun game

Last week my children were given this game as a gift. I thought that I should mention it on here as it is really fun,as well as being educational and it also has the advantage of not using dice.
The basis of the game is to describe a word to your team to guess as fast as possible. The describing player takes a card with a word on it, for example "toaster" and must describe it to the rest of his team, eg "It's a machine you put a slice of bread into to make it hot and browned on both sides." (You can't say "toast"!)
The more correctly guessed words guessed in the time limit the more spaces on the board your team can move on.
The game is aimed at 6 plus. A child has to be able to read the card to play (although someone from the other team could actually help with this). Ia was able to have a go, but she found it a little tricky to describe quickly, but I think it just takes practice, inshAllah. You need a minimum of 4 players to play in two teams and to make it fair the teams need to be evenly matched. It seems good for developing language skills in both listening and speaking, but, most importantly for a game, it is fun!

Summer break!

Summer break! I usually struggle to find things to blog about at this time of year. After all this is a home education blog andwe are on a proper break right now. Plus as I'm not needing to plan much this year I'm not even thinking much about home education at the moment! This is unusual for me! This morning I wrote out a list of resources to use with Ia next year. It took me about 10 minutes, alhamdulillah!

Instead I'm keeping busy with those odd jobsthat get put aside in the busier months, such as giving grubby skirting boards a fresh coat of paint, sewing and general sorting out. But I do find that I drift in these slower days, and I need a list of chores just to make sure something useful gets done!

The children are busy with what they enjoy, maashAllah. There is reading, hama beading and computer time, as well as getting out and about for some summery sunshine and meeting with friends. There has also been some interest in cooking as U chose three childrens cook books from the library this week.

The day to day is much the same, so not much new to blog about. And Ramadan is just around the corner now, inshAllah. I'll probably not be posting much until September, inshAllah, when we'll get back to home ed routines.

Enjoy the summer, inshAllah!

Seven Years

We have finished our structured home education for the summer. The girls are still working on the Ramadan lapbooks, a little each day and everyone is doing lots of reading and their daily Quran, alhamdulillah. The girls are enjoying the lapbookand my aim is to get it done by Ramadan, so we can take it slowly.
Usually at this time of year I get busy with planning ahead, but not so this year. I feel that I alreadyknow what my plans are, more or less we can just continue from where we are. Most of the resources I have already, and I have already decided what to fill the few remaining gaps with. In this respect home ed gets easier as time goes on I think. I've seen so many resources nowthat I have a much clearer idea about what I need and what suits my children. Even a couple of years ago it all seemed far less clearand I would keep checking and rechecking to see if something better than what I had could be found.
The end of this academic year marks another milestone, alhamdulillah! Most schools round here are officially breaking up throughout next week, although there are a few which have actually finished already. My sons would be about to leave primary school (had they been there), so I think they can now officially say that they've never been to primary school. It also means I can say that I've been home educating for seven years. Alhamdulillah! I'm so grateful that Allah has made this possible for us. I think we've learnt a lot as a family over these seven years and it has been a varied journey in style, method, situation and content!
Home education - always interesting!

Thinking ahead a little

Ramadan is only a few weeks away, inshAllah, and this year I'm thinking of doing things a little differently.
In previous Ramadans I have always kept some organised Islamic Studies work going, and before that when they boys were younger I did other subjects as well. Now things are different. One thing is that now Ramadan will fall during the summer holiday period, but the main difference is the age of the children. Younger children, I have found, need more help keeping occupied, but as they get older they get much better at keeping themselves busy, maashAllah, to the extent that sometimes they don't want to take time out from whatever they are doing even to do a fun activity such as art which I may have ready! I'm not complaining! This independance is a good thing, maashAllah.
So, for this Ramadan I'm not planning to list or organise their work in any way, instead, inshAllah, we will focus on the practical side of doing ibaadah, reading Quran, reading books and maybe listening to some lectures. This will mainly be me and the boys of course, but the girls can improve on learning their salaah inshAllah. U is now becoming keen to join in with salaah, maashAllah!
As a result of planning this way I decided to get started now with a Ramadan lapbook with the girls. Ia has not done one before because I was waiting for U to be old enough to join in properly. We began work on the lapbook yesterday. I'm afraid that I'm far too busy these days to come up with many new ideas myself, so I'm not being original with this lapbook at all, instead I'm looking at two example lapbooks made by other sisters and am putting together our own out of those two, maashAllah.
I'm using the Raising Muslims Ramadan lapbook and UmmK's lapbook which I put on Always Learning Resources last year.
I'm not sure how long we will take over the lapbook, but inshAllah we'll do a little everyday, especially as our other bookwork is now finished for the summer. I'm thinking of it as preparation for Ramadan!

Marzipan sweets

Today we made a simple marzipan paste which the girls then rolled and cut out. It was the first time we had made this. The dough was soft and did not crumble. It was just right for little ones, maashAllah. As long as the rolling surface remained dusted with icing sugar it did not stick either. This makes it a good dough to make with under 5s I think, especially if you have lots of fun shaped cutters. We just had round cutters.

This is the receipe:

50g icing sugar (sifted)

50g caster sugar

100g ground almonds

red food dye

100g sweetened condensed milk

Mix the dry ingredients, then add the condensed milk and blend to a paste. Add some food dye if you like. Wrap in food wrap and refridgerate for at least 20 minutes. Roll out and cut out on a surface dusted with icing sugar. Let them dry a little on a sheet of greaseproof paper.

History Through Literature

We don't do much history formally, as I have mentioned before. My sons are interested in history and seem to get to know plenty about it in their own ways, maashAllah. Imagine my surprise as we walked over to the park last weekend to hear them discussing together the actions of the Axis powers and Allies in World War II, the sequence of events etc! I've certainly not taught them about any of that, I don't prefer that sort of history myself!
I have always read a lot of literature set in history books to the boys. Some books give you plenty of historical information along with the story, especially the "My Story" series, while others just give you little bits of information amongst their story line, for example "Carries War" by Nina Bawden. Even E Nesbit's "Treasure Seekers" or "Railway Children" give you a little social history through their setting. Other books we've read include Ian Serraillier's "Silver Sword" and "Theres No Escape".
Currently I'm reading them Meindert Dejong's "House of Sixty Fathers" which is set in the Second Sino Japanese War of 1937-1945. Dejong has what seems to me a very individual style of writing, which is very simple and direct, but full of humour and insight. The book is about a boywho gets accidentally separated from his parents and his journey as he tries to get back and find them again.
I find that reading this type of literature with the boys gives them little windows of insight into different times and different places and sparks their interest to find out more.
As they grow older I have other books in mind for future reading inshAllah, such as "Empire of the Sun" byJG Ballard and " A Single Tear" by Wu Ningkun. There are so many more. Of course these books must always be seen as portraying one side of the story, the author's viewpoint and they are not intended to be historical accounts, but they give a flavour of their period and can lead on to further learning, inshAllah.

Science

The boys are very nearly at the end of Galore Park Science book 1. We spread this book out over two years. Most of the biology was done last year, with lots of diversions into further work, while the chemistry and physics sections were done this year. The questions can get a little dull, but all the information is clearly presented in there so the boys can read it and understand for themselves, maashAllah.
So, time to think about what to use next year. I looked at the second book from Galore Park, and will probably get that, but it is not appealing at all to find that most of the topics on the contents page look very familiar. This is the trouble with National Curriculum science, you seem to be going round and round over and over the same topics again with too much regularity. Yes, more depth is added each time, but it really would be more interesting to put two years worth of depth into one go, then give that topic a rest for a year at least! I can do that myself of course, I don't have to use a curriculum as a guideline at all. I have not kept to it exactly in any case.
With history and geography I just ignore the National Curriculum completely and we do our own thing. I don't need the guideline as I feel I know my way round those subjects sufficiently to find my own way. I recently heard a professor (whose name I forget) speaking on the radio saying that in his opinion a national curriculum for history was an "abomination". I took note, as this seems like a handy response for when asked why I'm not following NC.
So, the only reason why I feel I need a textbook "spine" for science is that without it I'd be wondering what to do and how to start. As I'm not a sciences person it doesn't appear as obvious to me as it does with humanities or languages. For many other home educators it must be the other way round. It is no co-incidence that our most structured study areas are maths and science.
But in any case looking at the on going curriculum content I can be reassured with my decision not to structure any science for under 7, and just to pick and choose the most interesting topics to enjoy after that. It is not like you can really miss anything. It will all becoming round again, like an unwanted dish on a sushi belt.

Literature studies

As we ease into summer mode, inshAllah, I thought the boys would enjoy a literature study. We've done these before and they usually find them interesting, maashAllah. This time I chose "Lord of the Flies"by William Golding and read it aloud to them, a chapter each morning. They were gripped by the story and were interested in the motivations and behaviours of the characters. The story is very violent too of course, and they were quite shocked by it. J couldn't wait for the last chapter, so he read it himself the afternoon before I read it aloud to them both.
Having finished the reading and all the discussion along the way I set aside time for them to do some essay writing . In this "end of term" mode I just cancelled a couple of other items of the shedule to give plenty of relaxed time for the writing.
I gave them the title of "Discuss the theme of authority in Lord of the Flies". In preparation I had made a series of sub-questions designed to be the content of paragraphs (eg, How is authority established on the island? How and why does authority breakdown and change? What are the symbols of authority? Discuss the differering natures of authority as shown here etc.)
We discussed the ideas for the paragraphs and then they got writing. It may seem like a lot, but because this is something they enjoy and find interesting the ideas flow, maashAllah. It is certainly a lot less stressful than a lesson on division of decimals!
I have a couple more topics up my sleeve for next week, inshAllah, "Discuss the many forms of the Beast" and "Playing with fire, fire as destruction and survival in Lord of the Flies". I think three topics altogether will be enough, although this book is so rich in themes and ideas that you could go on with it for weeks! Might take the edge off the enjoyment though! Again I've already sketched out an outline for these topics, which we will discuss and then they'll use to support their writing, inshAllah.
I asked R if he wanted to try rereading the book by himself, but he said he'd prefer to go back to it in a while, when the memory of it is not as fresh. I think if he does that then he will discover much more with a second reading.
Reading this novel as a Muslim it does strike me how the novel illustrates the need for divine authority, and how without that humans can so easily fall into oppression of each other. This is shown in both the island world and in the outer world, where a war is taking place. Critical analysis is often done through the lens of the critic's belief, be that Marxist, Feminist or whatever. This novel does lend itself to being looked at through a religious (or anti-religious)lens, but an Islamic lens in our case.

Garden pics

It is nearly the end of June already, subhanAllah. We are getting on with finishing off our work for the year, and spending time in the garden alhamdulillah.

The strawberries are starting to ripen. I think we've had three so far! Not exactly a bowlful, but we only have a few plants. Strawberries are very easy to grow, alhamdulillah, but to get a meaningful sized crop you do need space! Still, it is beneficial to even have these few, and they do taste good, alhamdulillah!

The garden is generally bloomimg, maashAllah, so time for a few pics on the blog!

Lion Lapbook

We have not done a lapbook for a while. Sometimes you can get too much of a good thing! But by last Thursday the girls were asking to do an animal lapbook and we got started on Friday. They did some over the weekend too and finished off today.

The whole of the lion lapbook was printed off from Homeschool Share. I added a story page, for some creative writing. Ia wrote her own, but U told me her story, I wrote it down and she traced over it.

Reptile encounter!

Today I took the girls to an animal encounters event being held in a community centre nearby. The girls wanted to hold the corn snake here, and they held it for quite a while. The snakes's tail went about 5cm up U's sleeve. She said it tickled!

Geography

This morning the boys were researching an African country each, using the internet. This is part of our geography study. I printed out a notebook page with the outline map of the African country chosen (today it was Egypt for R and Ethiopia for J) and they just got on with filling the page.
While they were doing this I thought that I really should mention the Trail Guide to World Geography again on this blog. Our geography study is based around the guide, and it really makes it easy for me to set independent work for them to tackle, maashAllah.
I have not bought the student notebook pages for the Trail Guide, just the main book. I use outline maps and notebook pages sourced elsewhere and put it all together in binder files. This also gives me the flexibility to get the boys to do some work as word documents.
As Ia moves into keystage 2 next year I think it will be a good time to start using the guide with her too, inshAllah. I think she'll use the project differently from theboys. I think she will be more interested in the wildlife and habitats of various countries, and we'll probably add some lapbooking elements as well. The guide is so flexible, and although it is sheduled into weeks I just ignore all that and let it flow along at a speed that works for us. After all, even if we never complete the whole world tour it won't matter. Skills will have been picked up along the way and more will be known about the world than before we started, inshAllah.

French Club

I've just finished using this French bookwith the boys. It comes as a set with a book 1 as well. I got them from the Book People. Book 1 was ok, but many of the audio pieces were songs which I did not like. Book 2 however is very good! The chapters do not teach a systematic or thorough approach, the book is not designed that way, but various bits of grammar are built on and through regular use the boys picked up lots of vocabulary, maashAllah. What I really liked about book 2 was the audio. The listening comprehension exercises are really good, varied with a varied way of recording answers. The conversations are relaxed, and go at a good speed, just enough for challenge. I found that the boys benefitted from the listening exercises, and this also improved their pronunciation.
I have been searching and searching for more such listening exercises, but the materials designed for use with children in keystage three areVERY expensive. I mean £80 plus for an audio cassette to go with a pupil book. Adult courses are cheaper, but generally just contain the sort of tourist vocab that young kids don't need to use. They are also usually set in a social context suitable for young adults, or business people, neither of which is any good either. I'd love to get Rosetta Stone, but it is just tooo expensive at the moment. All of this makes the Book Club course even more praiseworthy, as it comes at a decent price. There is a Spanish set too, (which I have not got.)

Quite some weeks ago the girls and I planted some seeds. Coriander and sunflowers. Here are the results so far, maashAllah!

Library books

I was very used to my old blog style. I don't bother to change things often. The look of something doesn't interest me too much, but because of the little arrow marks on the old template just where the date was I kept thinking there was a grubby fingerprint on my screen, when in fact it was the overlapping template. I would have probably been too lazy about it to make the change until blogger put that new design thing right in front of me!

The library books in the picture have helped keep the girls busy over the weekend, maashAllah. The Usborne Science make and do book has lots of fun activities inside. It is not really that scientific, as it doesn't explain the science behind the activities, but the activities are fun for exploring and building experiences. The girls have made shadow puppets and floating ice boats this weekend.

Since having the opportunity to handle a lizard recently Ia has become quite interested in them and picked out some lizard books from the library this weekend. She has been reading through them independently, maashAllah. She is very interested in animals at the moment, in fiction and non-fiction books, maashAllah. Last week she read about barn owls and large mammals. Having given her thoses reminders to read regularly I now findthat she has developed this into her own habit and I no longer need to remind her often, alhamdulillah.

Light and shadow

Today we've been learning about light and shadows and experimenting with the distance from the light source and size of shadow. J remembered that there is a night vision feature on one of the old mobile phone cameras, so we were able to get this picture!

As part of her games U has been writing out badges. She wrote "U r a star". I helped her spell star, she did the rest herself. Oh no, none of the others has begun writing in txt!!! She is the only one to just try writing it herself. The others always asked for the spellings! That is U being different again, maashAllah!

Basic update

We've been getting back into routine thisweek. Ia still has six weeks left on themaths curriculum. Every year the Collins maths is the last thing to get finished! The boys are making steady progress on the Conquer Maths programme. Whenever they find a lesson tricky I pause and do lots of further practice over the following days, usually from Galore Park book 1, until they are comfortable with the topic. I intend to just keep plugging along with the maths until we break for summer, inshAllah.
The boys have finished their English textbook for the year. We have used Galore Park 1. I liked this book, the texts were at the right level for us and the writing tasks were interesting without being prescriptive or over structured. However, the variety of texts was disappointing. There was no poetry or playscript in the whole ten units. I really can't understand why. I made enquiries on a home-ed forum and found that book two was not recommended, and I was advised to have a look at the WHSmith Challenge books instead. At first I had my doubts. I thought that a WHSmith book wasn't going to be up to much, but I was very surprised to find that there is a good variety of interesting tasks in there! Plus it comes with an answer key, has 20 units, and is very cheap! Of course the real test will come when I have to actually use the book from September, but I'm hopeful inshAllah. Until then I'm doing some read aloud literature with the boys, inshAllah.
Other topics and subjects are continuing slow but steady, maashAllah.

Our social week!

We have spent this week mainly meeting with friends, visiting our friends and having friends visit us! A social week! The boys have played cricket and football as well, but mainly it has been fun with the friends who usually go to school but who have been on holiday this week.

Release

It was time to release the butterflies. When they first emerged they didn't move around much, but by this afternoon they were fluttering about and their hatching habitat just seemed too confined. The first four left quickly,and flew off high into the air, maashAllah, far away from our garden. It is amazing, subhanAllah, as this was really their first flight.
The fifth one has not done so well. Maybe it was the one that emerged a day after the others. It took ages to come to the opening. It hung around. The kids had long gone. I had been staying nearby, but then I went in for a moment, and of course this is when it chose to begin its flight, only to be accosted by the cat. Oh dear. It has not been visibly harmed as I quicky picked the cat up, but it is still sitting on a plant next to the patio. It had had a long feed just before leaving, maybe it doesn't feel the need to seek food right now.

Better photo

Still waiting for butterfly number 5, but I managed to get a better photo of one of the others!

Butterflies

Yesterday afternoon we went out to the park for a couple of hours and when we came back one butterfly had emerged. This morning when I came downstairs a second one had emerged. Later I took the girls to the library and when we came back......

you guessed it, another one had emerged. So we missed seeing all of them come out!

Shortly after lunch I suddently noticed a fourth butterfly, but this one was all folded and crumpled, so had just emerged. I quickly called the children to watch how it started to straighten out. So, at least we saw a bit more of that one!

There is one more left, but that crysalide is not dark yet, so I don't expect that one today.

We have fed them with apple, grape and sugar water and we have seen them feeding, subhanAllah.

Handwriting

It is that time of year when we finish off and tidy up. This year Ia has been using the book above for handwriting skills. It teaches joined up writing, focussing on the joins between pairs of letters and building up into joining words. She has used it a little at a time, usually for about 10 minutes before the rest of her English work. She did the last bit today. I have the next book in the series, which she will use next academic year, inshAllah.
The book itself is good, it consists of 20 units, each divided up into short exercises, so it is easy to break up. It is a textbook, so the actual writing is done in a handwriting exercise book.
I can't find fault with the book itself, and indeed I recently saw another child's handwriting and just from looking at it I could tell that he had learnt from this series. I asked him and showed him the book. Yes, it was the one he had used in school!
The problem with handwriting is that it is boring. Ia now knows how to join her writing, but she still prefers to print, as she finds it easier and the result looks neater. Ia can write neatly,but if she finds the handwriting exercise boring she won't be as neat as she can. So, although I follow this handwriting course I sometimes wonder how much use it really is. I think I continue because at least then the child has the knowledge of how to join their letters, even if they choose not to implement that knowledge. It could be something they want to do in future.
Good handwriting is an important skill, but the child needs to want to have beautiful writing and I just don't know how any book, no matter how well thought out, can instill that! What is the secret?
So, at the moment I'm happy with correctly formed letters that are easy to read, a sensible size and a knowledge of joining! Alhamdulillah.

Reader Rabbit

If you are looking for up-to-the minute reviews of new products you are in the wrong place! I've just discovered Reader Rabbit, which is quite an old piece of software. But then you don't go looking for things until you need them I suppose, and until now I didn't consider buying software to help with learning to read, as it didn't seem necessary. U is a different sortof learner. She loves books, maashAllah, and will spend ages reading stories to herself through the pictures, maashAllah.However she is not too keen on reading through normal early reading books. I think it is because it takes longer than making the story up! And yet I know that she will, inshAllah, love reading once she can do it with ease, because she loves stories, just as the boys did and still do, maashAllah.
So, I started looking for software, because she does well with Education City, and she enjoys learning independently. Reader Rabbit has turned out just right for her because it is simple and uncluttered and has a clear route of progression. The disc began with work she is already familiar with, but she has also been able to learn new words too. She has used it every weekday since it arrived, maashAllah.
I did not expect to need many new resources for my youngest child, but you never know how things may turn out, subhanAllah.

Creative and caterpillars

The girls have had a creative day today, maashAllah, making bead designs, sketching and making flower pictures with cut-outs from catalogues. There has also been lots of playing in the garden.

Our caterpillars have started to change into chrysalides. This picture was taken in the afternoon, when a couple of them still look like caterpillars but by this evening they have changed some more.

Magnets

At the moment I'm using the Forces part of "Bite-Size Physics" with the boys. Today's lesson had something that everyone could enjoy - making magnets.

You just have to stroke an iron nail with a magnet, making sure to always go the same direction, until the nail becomes a magnet. In the picture the paperclip is magnetically attached to the nail. After that we dropped the nails on the paving outside to demagnetise them. Everyone had a go at this. The girls enjoyed the experiments and the boys learnt about the science behind it.

Alhamdulillah, it was great to have something for everyone!

The differences

These are the types of books that both girls are selecting from the library at the moment, amongst others. They are both slim paperbacks. I read them aloud to U and Ia reads them herself. A book like the one in the top picture is a quick read for Ia, but she enjoys reading something easy with cute pictures. She also chooses longer chapter books, which she reads one chapter at a time. With the sort of book pictured above she'll happily read through two or three at one go, maashAllah.
The book in the picture below is one she is reading aloud to me at the moment. It is a comfortable level for her. I tend to alternate the levels, letting her read one at comfort level, then another with a little bit more challenge, then back to comfort again. She usually has at least two books on the go, one she reads to me, the other by herself. She usually chooses the titles from the library herself, but some I keep for her to read aloud. She also enjoys non-fiction books about animals.

The thing is that having this type of book around is a novelty for me. The boys seem to have missed out this stage altogether and gone straight from learning to read to reading books designed more for the stage above.

It just goes to show how each child learns in their own way, even when you start them off in the same way, maashAllah.

Easy to do science

Today we have been rubbing electrons on and off things. Learning about electrical charges.

After being rubbed on hair the balloon attracts the strip of paper.

Same thing with the scarf and the shirt.