Chemistry Book

We are working towards some IGCSEs. The usual questions about IGCSE centre around whether they are recognized as equal to GCSEs, or whether they are accepted by colleges and so on. Usually the answers to these questions have involved assuring others that, yes they are actually recognized as being tougher than GCSEs, they are valid, run by the same exam boards etc etc. Strangely, in the light of recent political announcements it may now become the "in" thing to be doing exams that are not the normal GCSEs, and home educators who have to take the tougher IGCSEs anyway may actually find themselves already taking exams which look more like the government's newly planned ones. Swings and roundabouts of political fashion.
Anyway, that was not what I wanted to blog about today. I just wanted to mention the Edexcel IGCSE Chemistry textbook and say what an excellent textbook it is. It is written in such a friendly way. The author has a website to go with the book with a section especially for home educated students and parents. It actually feels welcoming - and I'm NOT a scientist! Can we do chemistry? With this book, inshAllah, yes we can!

Working together

.  When I started out on the home ed journey, nine years ago,  I was home educating co-operatively for part of the time. I didn't really intend it that way originally, but that's how it worked out. I received a call from another sister who had found my number on a contact list,  we met and eventually I found myself working along with two other families. This arrangement lasted for about a year and then some other friends wanted to start working together also and a new arrangement started. 

Working co-operatively has many advantages, especially at the beginning of the home ed journey, when your children are young (and fewer in number) and it helps to share skills and ideas, and to be able to enjoy friendships. In my experience working together gets harder as the children get older. Their needs diverge more, you have more younger siblings to deal with and generally peoples lives get more complicated. When it works well it is a great benefit - however in my experience it is best not to rely on any arrangements lasting too long. As with everything in home ed, make the most of opportunities as they emerge and be ready to embrace change when you need to, inshAllah.

I was recently asked to put together some thoughts on home schooling co-operatively. The following are some points I came up with. It is certainly not a comprehensive guideline, but maybe of use to someone, inshAllah. I should also point out that the type of co-operative set up I am describing is where the parents are the educators and want to share the task of education with others. In such a set up everyone is involved, and everyone is learning to be an educator. I have seen others organise co-ops where a group of parents clubs together to "buy" a teacher or teachers for their children but I have not been involved in that type of arrangement myself. I have also known of home education support groups which grew into small schools, but again I think of that as something different from a  home education co-op.
There are many ways to homeschool, or home educate, alhamdulillah! It is all about finding what works best for you and your family!

      Meet and discuss objectives. Be honest about why you are planning to homeschool co-operatively. What do you hope to achieve long term? Reasons will include: Islamic education for my child, social group for my child, companionship, not confident on my own etc, but should ALSO include: I want to develop my own ability to home educate my children, become a better educator, learn skills from others and share my skills.  These objectives need to raised clearly so everyone understands them. Such objectives make a homeschool co-op distinct from a group attempting to establish an Islamic school

2.       Research. If you are all new to home schooling assign research tasks on behalf of the group. Each person takes on the role of researching resources and methods for one subject area eg maths. This is NOT to select a method or resources for others to use but to put forward a range of options from what is available. Sharing the research task avoids the need for each individual to research each subject area for themselves and helps each person become familiar with the tools available for seeking out answers to homeschooling questions (eg, forums, yahoo lists, blogs, reviews.)

3.       Team teaching. If co-op classes are to be held arrange for them to be team taught – pairing someone stronger in a subject area with someone weaker in order to mentor the weaker partner. Rotate these pairings regularly so everyone has the chance to be in the weaker or stronger role and to share/learn skills.

4.       Role allocation. Make sure everyone has a role. This includes all roles that allow the smooth functioning of the group, such as looking after younger children while a sister teaches, shopping for supplies, playtime supervision etc. Work must be shared equally. If the burden falls too heavily on one or two people the project will eventually fold.

5.       Discipline. Be clear on discipline of the children from the start. Telling off each others’ children can be a very sensitive issue. Make sure rules and boundaries and discipline methods are agreed upon by all adults.

6.       Keep a group diary detailing activities and classes. Record what was taught and by whom. This diary needs to be available to all participants to update and read to make sure that everyone is aware of what the children are learning. This could be done in a notebook, but a group blog, kept private to members only, would be a good tool to use.

7.       Make 70 excuses for your Muslim sister.

Home educating long term

 This is an article I was requested to write recently. These are my thoughts based on my approach to home education. Others may do things differently.

Sustainable Homeschooling

Where do you see yourself in five years time? Only Allah (swt) knows whether we will still be alive in five years time and what our condition will be then, but what are your hopes? What intentions are you building on?

If you have currently chosen homeschooling (more commonly known as Home Education in the UK) for your family do you picture yourself, in five years time, learning around the table, making lapbooks? How about sitting together in a family halaqa or listening to your child recite Quran? Maybe your eldest boy will be mature and able to lead the prayers in your home. Do you imagine attending home school trips with like minded families, seeing your children enjoy and develop friendships which bolster and encourage their Islamic identity? Will you be setting up home chemistry experiments, tending a family vegetable garden or raising butterflies? It is a little different from dropping the kids off on a hectic, congested school run then keeping an eye on the clock until they return, but when you are a home educating family the possibilities are many.

How does that picture seem to you? How do you feel at the prospect of guiding your eldest through their GCSEs whilst setting out the playdoh for your preschooler and meeting the educational needs of everyone else in between? Do you feel excited by the challenge and ready to embrace the ever changing home schooling journey? It is certainly a prospect that grabs my attention!

But, you may be asking yourself, how do I get from where I am now to a point where I would feel confident and capable enough to be guiding my family through all the stages of their education. The answer is that you probably will never reach such a comfortable state, but you will be always trying, always striving to improve and trusting in Allah to get you through.

At the beginning of the home education journey the way forward can seem very unclear and the commitment daunting. After nine years of home educating I can say that the way forward does not necessarily get any clearer, you just learn to trust that you will get there, inshAllah. Until I actually embark on a new stage of home education and start experiencing it and working through it with my children I am never sure how it will play out. However much prior research I have done, I am always learning along the way. When it comes to homeschooling there is no substitute for hands on learning through experience, both for the kids and mum!

When I first became interested in home education I spent a lot of time reading up about it online and in books. I did my research. I wanted to know about different approaches to learning, how to teach a child to read, how to ensure a good understanding of maths and so on. I also wanted to know more about how other people have home educated. What is it really like? Nowadays with the proliferation of blogs, including those written by Muslim home educators it is much easier to find all this out than when I was looking some ten years ago. The research was good preparation and gave me lots of ideas to work with, but nothing could compare to when I actually got started with teaching my own children. Some methods I liked the theory of just seemed a waste of time when applied to my children. It was trial and error. I was learning as much as they were. There were ups and downs but over all we made progress, alhamdulillah. At the same time I was working with two other home educating families. Together we were learning how to home educate.

And we had time to do this. All of our children were still young. We were starting from the beginning.  We didn’t need to be perfect. At that young age children don’t have many academic goals to achieve, the important part of learning still revolves around play and developing an Islamic personality and manners.

Starting off with homeschooling can be likened to starting off with motherhood. At first the duties of caring for the newborn can be overwhelming. You don’t know what you are doing and small problems with the baby can cause a lot of stress. Few of us would look back, I’d guess, at how we managed our first baby and think of ourselves as ideal mothers. I certainly feel that I’ve learned from experience and although I’m still far from an ideal parent it is much easier with my fifth child than it was with my first, alhamdulillah. Experience is a good teacher. However, are my eldest markedly worse off as a result of my early parenting bloopers? I don’t think so. We have muddled through, alhamdulillah. Homeschooling is a skill like any other parenting skill. It takes time to learn, you make mistakes along the way but with determination you can achieve your goals, with the help of Allah.

With each new stage of the homeschooling journey, early years, primary, secondary, GCSEs I embark with a plan to hand, an outline of where I am going, but with an open mind. I ask Allah to help me find a way to make a success of this venture and, alhamdulillah, things become clearer and we find our way. Isn’t it like this for the stages of parenting too? From terrible twos to the teens, we learn along the way.

But is there another way you may be asking? Do I really have to do this alone? The answer to that is no – and yes.

In this country, legally speaking, home education is the responsibility of the parent. If anyone from the local authority enquires about your child’s education if he isn’t registered with a school the duty rests with you. Bearing this in mind however, children do not benefit from being brought up in isolation and making friends and learning with others are important parts of individual development. Getting together with other home educators, pooling skills and making friendships is a great way of helping each other learn homeschooling together.

This is how what I am going to refer to as “sustainable homeschooling” is achieved, inshAllah. When you take the decision not to enrol your child in school you are taking the decision to place the responsibility for their whole education on yourself. That responsibility was actually always yours in the first place, but a school can be used to delegate that responsibility to if required.

A school is usually an established institution. When you enrol your child in the Reception class you can reasonably expect that school to still be there to provide your child’s education all the way through until Year 6 (in most cases), should you choose to remain with that school. With home education the only factor you can realistically hope to remain constant (by the Will of Allah) for that long is yourself.

Homeschooling is all about making the most of opportunities as they appear and being active in creating those opportunities too. In my experience home education is a journey of constant change. This has its advantages. My children have had the privilege of growing up with a variety of educational experiences from art workshops to horse riding, swimming, trips and the caring input from a variety of other adults. I have always tried my best to taking advantage of such opportunities knowing that they will not last indefinitely. Usually change occurs because someone moves on in life. Families relocate, bringing an end to a set of co-operative classes, or social meet-ups; a new baby arrives and the sister can no longer teach a class. Also people change jobs or a venue is lost leading to the cancellation of a sports class or series of workshops. I have seen this happen again and again over the years. If a school loses a member of staff they simply recruit a replacement. It is not as straightforward with homeschooling. A home educator needs to be flexible and resourceful and able to come up with solutions.

However, although variety is stimulating and interesting, consistency and stability are also crucial in the child’s education.  As a home educator I feel I need to maintain the role of primary educator for my children, especially in the core academic subjects.  While I am eager to benefit from the skills of others in my community I know that my involvement is the most significant factor in my children’s education. Incidentally it is often stated that parental involvement is also very important for the successful education of children who attend school.

There are some subjects for which I know I need outside help, most notably Quran and Arabic and at higher levels some aspects of maths and science. My solution is to seek tuition help when I need it and to supplement everything else as often as I can with as wide a range of educational opportunities as I can afford.

Personally I chose home education for my children as I believed it offered the best form of education for my children when compared to school. Many others choose home education in order to avoid the state system or because they cannot afford a private Islamic school for their child. The dilemmas of choosing the best educational method continue to apply throughout the child’s educational years. If state school is not a desired option at age 5 the same will probably remain true at age 11 or 14. In my view it makes sense to develop options that will be sustainable throughout the whole period of compulsory education. If home education is to be one of those sustainable options then it needs to be at the centre of the family home life. That may sound like a challenging commitment, but all it means is getting involved and being willing to join your child on a learning journey. Whilst being hard work this can truly be a joyful experience.

 May Allah make easy what we sincerely do for His sake.

Ramadhan Mubarak

Once again the blessed month of Ramadhan has arrived. May Allah accept our duas, increase our emaan and allow us to benefit from all the barakah of this special month. Ameen.
Ramadhan mubarak!

What has happened to this blog?

In case there is anyone wondering I am still here, still home educating. No one has gone into school, we are continuing as usual, alhamdulillah.
I stopped updating this blog because I felt that as my kids grow older it becomes harder to blog authentically without somehow compromising their privacy. To write publicly about young children is something I felt comfortable with, but as little children mature into teens it doesn't seem quite right any more and I don't want to write a "half blog" only about my still primary age girls.
I'm not going to remove the blog, and maybe one day I'll return to it, but for now, thanks for dropping by to read this, and if you are a home educator, enjoy these moments with your children. They really do grow up so fast!

Electronics

 This year the boys are doing physics topics in science. I bought them an electronics set which arrived this morning. I'm really pleased with it, it is easy to use with very clear, sensible instructions and there are lots of experiments to do!  They spent a couple of hours on it this morning. Here is the link : Secondary 2

Makkah Lapbook

 Last week the girls completed lapbooks on Makkah. We based this project on the first chapter of  "Muslim Cities Then and Now" by Susan Douglas, from the Islamic School book series. The textbook chapter is called Makkah During the Hajj. The book contains helpful teachers notes and I used these and the workbook pages as part of the project. I just added my own ideas to make lapbook mini books to go alongside.
Our lapbooks contained mini books on the following:
How Makkah Began: A recount of the story of Hajar and Ismael (as) in the desert, Zam Zam and the building of the Ka'bah.
What is Makkah like at Hajj time?: A description based on materials in the book. We had recently watched a documentary on Hajj, which was also helpful to the girls in being able to picture the scenes.
Travelling to Hajj: This mini book listed the conditions for travelling in the past and in modern times. The two lists were side by side, so a comparison could be made.
Makkah and the Kab'ah: This was another comparison mini book, this time comparing how Makkah and the Kab'ah used to look in the past with the modern day scene. The girls did some illustrations. There are lots of pictures online to look at to help with this. This mini book also gave the opportunity to use descriptive language.
The Hajj Journey: This was a worksheet from the book, showing the actions of Hajj.
Where is Makkah?: a map
What is the Arabian desert like? We did this first, as a scene setting exercise, so that the girls could understand a little of the geographic and climatic conditions of the region.
Makkah at the time of the Prophet (saw): This mini book listed a few facts, for example that the Prophet (saw) was born in Makkah and that he later conquered the town and the inhabitants embraced Islam.

The blue lapbook is Ia's and the yellow is U's.

Teaching Ideas

This morning I was looking around for links to writing tasks for year 2 when I came across an activity from Teaching Ideas. They have some nice writing prompts in the non-fiction section and some templates for the writing to be done on the computer. My girls had fun writing newspaper reports about an escaped zoo animal and making lost pet posters. I printed out their work to put in their year files.
Later they used an activity from the science section linked with our current habitats topic

Angels Lapbook

My daughters have completed a lap book on Angels. I based the lapbook around the contents of Muhammad al-Jibaly's book "Knowing the Angels", part of the Eeman Made Easy series. This lapbook has taken a while in coming, I started it in Ramadan, but we had a couple of weeks off here and there so it was a slow progress. I just did a little on the project every day we worked on it. One one day I'd read to them from the book and on the next day we'd make a mini-book on that information so I could see what they had remembered. The book is written for older kids than my daughters so I did abridge it as I went along.

Altogether we summarized the key information into five mini-books.
The Five pillars of Emaan, What are Angels like?, What do Angels do, The Character of Angels and Angel Facts.

 The mini-book above summarizes things about the character of angels.

 This one summarizes things they do.

This one illustrates the pillars of Emaan. That was included to explain the importance of studying this topic.
A couple of years ago I used another of the Emaan series to do a lapbook with the boys. They are useful books for kids, maashAllah.

Book stand

Yes we are still here, still home educating. Not so much I feel like blogging here these days. As children get older I feel that their lives deserve more privacy, but I expect I'll pop back from time to time with something home ed related.
We had a long summer break this year, but are back to full swing home ed now, alhamdulillah.
Today I just wanted to share my bookstand lightbulb moment!!!
We all spend much of our time in a room with a big table in it. However, that table soon becomes filled up with clutter from whatever activities we are doing. Sometimes there'll be someone on each side of the table pushing books into the other person's space, not to mention all the other bits and pieces that end up on there.
Finally I thought of getting a book stand, and what a difference it makes - it immediately seems to expand the table and makes the books easier to see. I'm seriously thinking of getting a couple more!

Looking for resources

Over the last couple of days I've been looking into English resources to use with the boys next academic year, inshAllah. This year we used a WHSmith book called Challenge English. It did the job, so I decided to look for the next book in their series. It is currently out of stock on their website, which is not a good sign, as if the publisher of a book is out of stock of it then it may be about to become unavailable. Anyway, maybe its a good thing, as I started to look around at alternatives. The boys like something fresh to restart a new year with and probably the Challenge book would have been very similar to what they worked through last year.
Finding resources for this age is quite confusing. Using the Amazon look inside facility I previewed pages from various types of books being sold for use with secondary English. I didn't just look at books for the boys' own year group, but also at those for slightly older, so I could get a sense of comparison and direction.
The levels are very diverse, and it makes it clear that by this stage age is definately not the best guideline for suitability of resources, you must match up your child with the book, not your child's age. For example, I looked at GCSE course books which seemed easier in content than the Year 7 book we completed this year. I also looked at GCSE books that were much harder. I found a Year 9 (pre GCSE) book from Galore Park, which is also much more challenging than pretty much any of the GCSE course books I looked at. What about books for earlier in the 11-14 age range? Well, these seemed harder to find, unless I was interested in workbook style materials that don't seem that different to materials made for the end of primary school. Galore Park has its series, but I'm not sure if I just want more of the same from there.
Hmmm.
So, I thought, what sort of skills should we be covering for English?  What are our gap areas? This year we've done lots of reading comprehension and writing tasks. We've also done some whole book studies and started working on essay writing skills. I feel that I can continue with whole book studies independently. I realised that I need to focus more on writing for different purposes. I can see why the boys have not developed those skills as much yet, as I think they find this the more boring side of writing. I know I always did. Writing to be persuasive, or to present an argument within the context of English study always seemed a bit empty to me. I think it can be more interesting to develop these skills within the context of another subject which you enjoy, rather than on random topics which may feel irrelevant.
So, bearing that in mind I think I will prefer to use other subjects as a vehicle for most of those skills, however I think we should do a little in English too. The other area I certainly need materials for is poetry. I always quite enjoyed poetry myself, but I think it is much more subjective and a matter of personal taste than prose. The boys really don't want to discuss poems in the same way that they are ready to discuss our whole book studies. I think they don't want to examine the details like that, they prefer wider themes and characterization gained from whole books. So, it would help to have a book to summarize key poetry points for them, so they get the picture without labouring over the thing too long.
Lastly I thought that maybe there are bits of grammar and usage they should tighten up on. Some terminology they do need to be able to use, which perhaps they have not bothered to retain up until now, as it isn't really necessary for reading comprehension or basic writing styles, which can both be gained through general wider reading.
So, those were the criteria with which I returned to the Amazon listings. Searching through I think I've found what I want. As I'm just looking for general skills and not working towards any particular syllabus I was able to go for a  GCSE textbook which is out-of-date as far as the specifications are concerned, and so is very cheap. That book focuses on developing writing for different purposes. It also does reading skills. Although it is GCSE the sample pages show that it is no harder than the book we used last year, just laid out more colourfully!
Secondly I found an "essentials" type book, which was very cheap, so although I couldn't check inside I think is worth the risk. Hopefully this will cover the grammar and usage type bits for the 11-14 age group and will be quick about it.
Lastly I found a book just on poetry analysis. There are lots of poems in it and no doubt some will be harder than others, so I'll pick and choose between the materials as I try to introduce this topic. I have not ordered that yet.
So, the plan is to be more pick and mix with English next year, to focus on certain skills that need work, while developing other skills in the more enjoyable ways that we started using this year. There is nothing worse than dreary English. Who can be bothered to write about meaningless topics?
But this does feel like a very "in-between" stage. I know the boys are not ready to properly work towards an English GCSE, and there is no need for that at all, however they do need something a bit fresher and different from the style of work done at primary age. Maybe its just me, but it all feels a bit like I have to build the direction myself. I don't remember it being that way at primary level. It all seemed clearer then!
Edited to add: Still not all neatly resolved yet! On further examination the poetry book was not what I had hoped for, so I'm leaving that. I looked further at Galore Park books, but I don't like their choice of extracts at all. If the Challenge book becomes available I will get it inshAllah, as it is not necessary to work through all of it, and it will have its good points.

Kimba Lapbook

 Ia has completed her short lapbook study of "Kimba" by Geoffrey Malone. The book is a wildlife story, fictional but portraying lions as realistic animals. No talking lions here! I read the story aloud to the girls, then did some follow up work on it with Ia.
These are the different booklets she made:
1. Characters book. In this she wrote a short description of each of the main characters.
2. "What will happen next?" This was a piece of creative writing continuing the story from the end of the book.
3. Adjective and verb flowers. Ia made a list of the adjectives which could be used to describe the lead character, Kimba, and a list of verbs to show what Kimba did.
4. Ia wrote a book review of her opinions on the story.
5. Rewriting an incident. For this piece of writing I found an incident in the story in which Kimba encounters men for the first time. The whole book is written in the third person, so Kimba's actions are described from the outside. In the incident where he encounters men Kimba's experience and reaction is very richly described, so I asked Ia to rewrite this extract of the book in the first person. I explained to her she would write as if she were Kimba, using "I". She needed to stick to the version of events as described in the book, but just tell it in "Kimba's own words".

As I said yesterday about the river project there is probably more I could have done with this book study, but I think it is usually better to stop before reaching the point where the child is totally fed up of the project! Overkill is definitely best avoided! I would rather move on to something else which is fresh and interesting than do a topic to exhaustion.
Overall  Ia enjoyed this variation to her English studies, alhamdulillah and I intend to do more of them in the coming academic year, inshAllah. I started book studies with the boys when they were year 4 (age 8-9).
Sometimes I do find that the writing suggestions in English textbooks are too detached and irrelevant. Book studies are one way of finding something more interesting to write about, inshAllah.

River Project

Over the past couple of months the boys have been working on a river project based on the river near us. They completed the final piece yesterday. I didn't plan this whole project out in advance, it started with an idea and evolved from there. Neither is it a project that is filed all in one place, it comprises some written work and some powerpoints, so it is not something that can be photographed or displayed. I've done some blog posts connected with this before, but now its time to sum up.
This is a summary of the different tasks that have gone to make up the project:

1.We walked along the areas of the river near us, photographed it at different locations and noted different features. This was done over several days, each day visiting different stretches of the river. At home the boys assembled the photos into a powerpoint presentation to describe the area of the river we had visited. This focussed on describing the features, looking at erosion etc.

2. I borrowed a book about the river from the local studies section of the library. We read about the background and history of the river and its role both  in our local area and other areas it flows through. The boys made some notes on this.

3. Using the textbook "Geography fieldwork Projects" by Jennifer Frew we read about how fieldwork can be carried out on rivers. We carried out a fieldwork project on measuring the river's flow, and the boys wrote up their results for their geography files.

4. Some time later we carried out a second fieldwork exercise on investigating the river's load, which also got written up for the files.

5. Using several internet sources the boys found examples of different ways the river is currently used by people (eg leisure, wildlife sanctuaries), and some examples of historical uses (eg water mills, transportation). From this they put together powerpoint presentations to explain different uses of the river, (along its whole length,) and compare past uses with current ones.

6. Again using the textbook mentioned above we read about assessing water quality in rivers. We then searched online for information about the water quality of our local river. We found several sources of information on this. From those sources the boys put together a report looking at how water quality is assessed, problems of pollution and efforts being made to improve water quality in the river we have been studying.

I'm sure there must be many more things we could have done to extend this project further, but it seems to have run its course with us and now seems the right time to draw this particular study to a close.
However, during this long look at one particular river we have come to know it quite well, and I feel that this won't be forgotten in a hurry. Bringing something local into geography study has been really beneficial, maashAllah. Also I've come to know of some locations along the river, a little further away from us, which I'd like to visit inshAllah, so looking forward to being able to do that too.

Beads and lions

After Ia received her castle U wanted something to make herself. She chose a jewellery making set, which arrived yesterday. In the afternoon we made the clay beads, which I then baked in the oven. Today she has threaded this necklace. We have worked on this together, and Ia has joined in too. U finds it more fun that way, she doesn't want to do the whole thing herself. The beads were not too difficult for her to shape or thread, but the knots on the necklace were tricky so I did those for her.
This week Ia has been working on a literature lapbook. I read "Kimba" by Geoffrey Malone to the girls a few weeks ago. It is a realistic wildlife story about a lion. I thought they could both do a lapbook on it as part of their English study, but U wasn't keen. Today Ia made petal books, one of verbs and the other on adjectives. She made a list of adjectives which could be used to describe Kimba, and a list of verbs to show what Kimba does (roar, snarl, pounce, sleep etc). InshAllah I'll post this when its done. I'm determined that we should get it done within the next couple of weeks, inshAllah!
Meanwhile the girls continued their interest in big cats by watching a BBC four documentary about tigers, called Spy in the Jungle. It featured new cubs - so inevitably a hit!!!

A castle please

Last week Ia said that she'd like to make a castle. I was rather defeated by this suggestion, having already got rid of all the cardboard boxes and tubes that pile up so often.
After a quick search I found this Usborne cut out  model book, which arrived today. It took Ia and I about an hour to make this small portion of the castle! It is fiddly work, but she is enjoying this project, maashAllah. Let's see how long it takes us to put it all together!!

Home ed highlight #2

Examining the river's load. We went down to our local river/stream again today to look at the features of the riverbed, as part of our geography fieldwork endeavors. The kids picked up samples of stones of different sizes from the riverbed, which we measured, weighed (if they were big like the one below), and recorded the colour and shape.

Everyone likes wading, even when the boots leak!!!

Little Highlights

Even when we are not home educating in a structured way, we are home educating. You can't get away from it really. Even when the parent takes a break the child continues the education in one way or another. Its just living.
It feels like summer - even though its April - and after this break I feel like it should be the summer holidays! It feels strange to think of getting back into the swing of structured days. I think the children feel the same!
I don't update this blog as often as I feel I should. Somehow I find I'm running out of things I can say here, that I haven't said before, but maybe I should be on the look out for those little home ed highlights, the things that tell me its all ticking along, alhamdulillah
Today I did some sewing. I made a khimar and a rough and ready laundry peg bag, using some left over cotton and a small clothes hanger (the kind that comes with small size kids clothes). Seeing me sewing made the girls think of making little clothes for their soft toys, so they got out the scrap bag and cut out bits of fabric to make non-sewn coats, scarves etc. Different fabrics cut in different ways. Some slip about, some easily tear, depending on the direction you make the cut. Today's little highlight: learning about cutting fabrics.

Spring pace

From today we are taking a couple of weeks off, to coincide with the school holidays. As most of my kids' friends go to school they like to treat those weeks differently too.

As another sister recently remarked as children get older you just get busier! Although when busy with little ones and their constant demands you can feel very tied down you do still get to set the timetable. As they get older I'm finding myself busy with accomodating their various activities and  having to work myself around the timetable that brings to me. Its a different sort of busy! Plus, I suppose when they are younger you do get periods of the day when everyone else is asleep, either first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Now of course that is no longer the case either, as pretty much everyone goes to bed at the same time, and only U tends to sleep a little longer in the mornings.

So, although the weeks have gone by and I have blogged very little here, home education and life in general has been continuing apace, alhamdulillah. In fact, if anything things just seem to get faster and faster, as I try to squeeze more and more in!

Recent good weather saw us taking time in the garden and bringing the books out there too whenever possible. The boys have been doing lots of their usual outdoor sports practice and also cycling, alhamdulillah. The garden is really too small now for them to play "football" in, as their kicks will always send the ball staright into the hedge, and they can only run a few paces before reaching the hedges themselves! However, it is still good for cricket shots, so they can go outside for hours just bowling at eachother, maashAllah! They are getting better at controlling their shots now too, so fewer balls go over the hedge.

Last week I put U on a free trial at Reading Eggs.co.uk, which I heard about via a sister on the IHSAN forum. Clearly this has come along too late for us, as U has really grown out of this stage of reading, maashAllah. She has been enjoying playing the games, as there is plenty of novelty value to the site, however I don't think she has really learnt anything new, as the word level she was placed at is pretty easy. So, I won't be enrolling her after the trial expires. However I think that if I had found this site a year or so earlier I would have been really tempted to sign up. It looks really good for a child of around four to get started with.

Sunny days also saw me return to Ia's science topic on light and shadow. One day last week she spent the day recording the different lengths of the shadow cast by a brick standing on end in the garden. It goes to show what a grey winter we had that I didn't feel we could do a whole day experiment like that until now! Of course the book she was working with told her that the shadow should be shortest at noon, but as we are in British Summer Time, of course it was shortest at around 1pm, by the clock. So, this led to a discussion about the  changing of the clocks.

So, we are still here and still immersed in our life of home ed, maashAllah. Now in these weeks of break I have the delights of spring cleaning (!), next term planning and maybe a little sewing to look forward to!

Reading (again)

Anyone who reads along here from time to time may notice that I have an ongoing theme with sourcing reading materials, especially for the boys. It just gets harder and harder. The library selection of books for the "young teen" age range is very poor. If horror or fantasy is your style, then maybe you are happy with what's on offer. If you are a girl whose interests are gossiping, backbiting and general rudeness then you are probably satisfied too. If you don't like either of those types of books then the library has hidden away the reading stock you'd like in the "reserve store".
You have to be pretty determined to unearth items from the reserve store. To start with you have to know the authors or titles you want to read. This means you need someone who read them to recommend them. If you are a kid then this is quite hard. Your friends can't recommend books they've never seen either. I asked around on a home educator forum full of clever home educators and someone suggested the author Geoffrey Trease.
Since getting this name I've ordered lots of Geoffrey Trease books from the reserve stock and the boys are really enjoying them. Most of these books have not seen the light of day for as long as ten years. They have the price in shillings on the cover. They are historical, adventure stories. The main character is always a teenage boy. I liken it to grown up Famous Five in an historical context. The boys are always "decent", the girls are always no-nonsense with a touch of tom-boy. The history in there is often based closely on real events, but is so wrapped up with the adventure story that it is effortlessly absorbed. It's ideal for my sons at the moment. So good not to be hearing "What shall I read now?" every few days!
Geoffrey Trease wrote loads of books, but the library stock is dwindling. Only the survivors remain in the store. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Geography fieldwork

Today we took advantage of some sunny spring weather to do a little more on our rivers project. Today we did fieldwork on measuring the rate of flow. We found a shallow, but quite fast flowing area to investigate. We placed markers using string attached to either side of the bank, to mark the start and finish lines. On one side we tied the string to plants, on the other we found a piece of wood lying about, which we made into a post. We placed the two lines 10 metres apart.
Next the boys took measurements using a measuring tape. They measured the depth of the channel by either bank, and in the middle, then they measured the width of the channel. They did this at both lines.
Next it was time to measure the flow. We used clementine peel as a float. R put it in the water at the start line and started the stopwatch. J caught it at the other end and called out to stop the timing. I recorded the results. We measured from the left, right and middle three times each.
After that everyone had a paddle in the water (except me), then we came home. InshAllah we'll be putting the results together later this week.