This and That

Well, it rained a lot today, so I did a teensy bit of housework. Not that you can really tell.

Actually, today was nice and varied. The boys got their work done in good time this morning, as they had things they wanted to get on with in the afternoon.

I read to them about Aisha (ra), they read Quran, used the French cdrom and did some maths. After that we finished off our study of Yusuf (as) , by reviewing his history in the light of the duties of the Prophets, making notes. Lastly we did some geography, looking through a chapter on farming around the world in a geography textbook I have and then using the internet to make lists of crops produced in various countries around the world.

Ia did some French and some letter work on the computer too. She did a little workbook stuff, listened to me read quite a few books,some stories, some about animals and she did colouring and collage. Both girls helped me collect snails in the garden and put them on the compost heap, where snails can feast all they like. To understand the effectiveness of this solution imagine the way in which a crawling baby is deterred from touching buttons on a TV/DVD player/video slot by moving him to the other side of the room and showing him a toy designed for his age.

We also spent a few minutes practising to roll like gingerbread men, which is an exercise U learns in minigym.

The Wheel On The School (by Meindert Dejong) Lapbook

We made sections on the following:

The adult characters

The child characters (their names and roles in the story)

A picture of the type of landscape in which the story is set

A Themes pocket, in which I put the mini essay booklets the boys had written

Descriptions of the clothing worn by the characters

Descriptions of the houses

Map of the region in which the story is set

Stork information (The brown scribble is meant to be a picture of a nest. Yes, I know. I did not want them to draw a living creature, and with no printer I can't print out a picture of one)

While the sun shines

When the sun shines I get more lenient with the study schedule. Playing outside is such a memorable part of childhood, I just want to let them enjoy it. This being the UK it could be dull and rainy for most of the next few months! So, making the most of now!
I've also been doing laundry while the sun shines. Fitting those odd loads in on top of the normal ones, like, cricket whites, red stuff (not together of course).
But still some HE has to go on. There is only so much garden stuff to be played in a day, and brains have to be kept occupied. The boys have done some work on capacity today, listened to a chapter about the life of Abu Ubaidah (ra), read Quran and done an ICT exercise on adjusting fonts, text sizes and inserting pictures. We also finished up the year 4 science programme, with looking through the last couple of textbook pages and doing an assessment sheet on the electricity unit.

Ia had a friend over to play and learn with. They play together at tea parties and pets. In between times friend's mum and I prepare bits and pieces for them to do, which we give to them after food breaks!
Today we did a little introduction of place value. The girls used interlocking cubes to make representations of 11, 12, 13 and 14, using a stick of 10 cubes and then the number of extra unit cubes. They copied these representations onto 1cm squared paper. Large sized squared paper seems relatively hard to get hold of, I don't know why, it is SO useful.
Friend's mum had a good idea of getting them to collage their names written in Arabic, one letter at a time, so we began that too, using old wrapping paper as collage material.
I have managed to weed the back border today, which is the worst for weeds, with ground elder, herb robert and bindweed entrenched and spreading from neglected plots on the other side of the fence. I'm turning the corner into looking at the garden and seeing the beauty, rather than just seeing the mess. There are lots of highlights, as the photos show, maashAllah. I know the photos often don't add any meaning to the text, they are just there to brighten the page.

Balancing garden, home.......

Although, as I mentioned in my last post, I don't tend to mention much about non-HE matters in this blog, I have read a little from other people in the last few days about how they manage their household tasks, and their words do give me a boost! Somehow the idea of other people buzzing about their homes changing sheets, doing laundry and whatever makes me more inclined to get on with things myself. This is especially helpful on days when the workload seems overwhelming. The growing season in the garden means lots of weeds popping up everywhere, it can feel like a race to quell them before they take over. Similar to the sprouting of dirty dishes in the kitchen and toys from the carpets.
So, in a break from the norm, over the weekend I have......

...actually, no, I can't remember it that clearly, but it did involve taking shears to some overgrown grass, using the handpush mower on the shorter stuff, planting marigolds and other bedding and...

Enough of that. Last night the snails munched the best sunflower. There one minute, gone the next. There is one survivor of the giant sunflowers, will it be there tomorrow, or will the massacre continue? I planted some more seeds in large pots today. They won't get so big in there as they should, but at least they'll get a better chance of survival. By the way, I don't want to use chemicals on the snails, I'm not protecting food crops I need for my survival.

Back to some HE today. The boys studied the tafsir of Surah Al-Qariah, and made a poster of the meaning, with some illustrations of fire. They also did maths, wrote a mini essay on the treatment of the character Janus in the Wheel on the School, read Quran, listened to me read to them about Abu Bakr (ra) and went cycling.

The girls did painting, played with ink stamps, played role play games and messed about in the garden.

Finally, they all went to bed by nine, in the hope that they might get up earlier tomorrow and we might not have such a slow start to the mornings. InshAllah.

Having written all this, don't we live in such a bubble? May Allah save us from the tests of earthquakes, cyclones, intertribal violence, civil war. Alhamdulillah, I am grateful for a messy house.

Ticking Along

I have not posted much this week, because we have not been doing much recordable home ed. The only things I kept ticking over were Quran and maths.
We've been out and about a bit too, visiting friends, running errands and keeping up with the weekly sports activities.
I have done some planting out in the garden, but remain cautious because of the nightly feasts held by the garden snails. I didn't spend time and effort on the seedlings just to feed snails with them. They have munched through J's contender for the Tallest Sunflower competition. He hasn't noticed yet.
InshAllah I'll be back next week with more home ed, as I really don't have the knack of recording the daily this and that of life in an interesting way. Where others can write about mowing the lawn and trimming the edges in a readable manner, I just do the chores, and leave it at that.

Being lazy!

Why have we made autumn leaves in spring? Well, the green food colouring just wasn't strong enough! The leaf shapes came ready cut on absorbent paper. They dried fast on the washing line.

Due to yesterday's public holiday and the sunny, warm weather a holiday mood is continuing here, so only a little work done today. The boys designed three types of switches, such as the one shown below. They did get it to work, although it was a bit flimsy. Aluminium modelling wire is good for these types of projects.

One day last week I got Ia to do some junk modelling in the morning while I did some work with the boys. This was a good way to occupy both girls, as after the toy house was made they played with it for ages. And did puzzles.

A sunny weekend means I've been in the garden. MaashAllah.

Lapbook on Yusuf (as)

We prepared for this Project by reading Ibn Kathir’s tafsir of Surah Yusuf and “Tell Me about the Prophet Yusuf”, by Saniyasnain Khan. Then we made lapbook sections as described below.
1. We traced a map of the region in which Yusuf (as) lived. We traced this from “the Atlas of the Quran” (Darusalaam).
2. We used a Layered Look Book to list the best known members of Yusuf (as)’s family, with some information about each. (Ishaq (as), Ibrahim (as), Yaqub (as), Binyamin and the ten half brothers).
3. We used little cloud shaped cut outs to summarise the lessons to be learned from the story of Yusuf (as), under the headings, Always Obey Allah, Patience, Forgiveness, Ease follows hardship for the Believers.
4. We used a fold cut out in the shape of a golden cup to tell the part of the story concerning Binyamin and the golden cup.
5. We used a fold with a picture of a garment to write about the garments of Yusuf (as). The blood stained garment that his brothers showed Yaqub (as)when they said that Yusuf (as) had been killed by a wolf; and the garment that Yusuf (as) sent to his father and which Yaqub (as) placed on his face, restoring his eyesight by the will of Allah.
6. We used a fold to write about Yusuf (as)’s time in the well.
7. We used an Envelope Fold to write about the four dreams. The dream of Yusuf (as) when he saw the sun, moon and stars prostrate to him, the two dreams of the men with whom Yusuf (as) was imprisoned and which he interpreted, and the dream of the King of Egypt.
8. We used a small booklet fold to write about the sequence of incidents which happened to Yusuf (as) in Egypt.