Tuesday

Day 2 of the revised timetable.
The mornings seem to be getting a bit drawn out at the moment. The boys are taking ages over breakfast, but still we got everything done today, alhamdulillah.
In the morning I read the rest of the history book we began yesterday. The girls listened in too. U is willing to look at any book with pictures, and Ia is starting to take more of a general interest in things, maashAllah.
Maths for the boys was more on 3D shape from yesterday, and Ia did maths on finding the number 10 more than another number, and placing numbers in sequence. Ia has also been doing lots of the Education City maths without any input from me, I was surprised to notice today how much of it she has completed, alhamdulillah.
We went out briefly today, to the local shop, over slushy, slippery pavements. Much more hazardous when partly melted! R had earned another treat, as he has memorised Surah Teen. These completed surahs are getting done quickly at the moment, alhamdulllah. I am pleased with this. The method I'm using with them for their Quran is very slow, but "without tears". Basically I get them to go over and over the 30th Juz, reading from the book, using the computer. Again and again and again. So, that when they come to memorise a surah they are already so familiar with the look of the text, and the sound of the recitation, that it is much easier for them to learn.
A year ago R would say that he couldn't memorise anything, that it was too hard, now, maashAllah, he gets on with it confidently. And there is no rush. They can take as long as they like over a surah, the promise of the prize encourages them on. They do read from other parts of the Quran too, also using the computer. Their daily work comprises both these aspects of learning.
Similarly with Ia, I get her to go through the last 10 surahs everyday with the computer. The idea is that she will memorise without realising it!
The boys also did some typing practice today. We have been using an Excel based workbook since the autumn, and have reached about halfway through it. It is designed to cover Keystage 2, so I think that we can take a break from it now and finish the rest of it off next academic year. Typing practice should continue I think. We are using the typing course on Alison, and also today I asked them to type up some other written work they handwrote last week.
Tuesday is currently the day for a longer Islamic Studies lesson. At the moment we are studying "Knowing Allah" by Muhammad al-Jibaly. For now I'm reading the chapters aloud to them. I plan, inshAllah, to do some project work on the topic afterwards.
Ia is currently working on an "Under the Sea" colouring project. She has also asked me to read chapter books aloud to her, as I do with the boys. When looking through the book shelves last week she heard me mentioning how J had laughed and laughed out loud while reading "The Aardvark Who Wasn't Sure", by Jill Tomlinson. It was his first proper chapter book. She wanted me to read it to her, but hasn't yet seen what was so funny! I think they have very different senses of humour, alhamdulillah.

Another week, another timetable

No, no, I'm not really that bad. Just a few changes, inshAllah. A bit more involvement from R in terms of how things should be organised. J was asked too,but didn't have much to say.
So, what the boys did today:
I read half of a history book from the library to them. A certain amount of history is required for a good general knowledge I think, and this can be easily learned informally, by reading. History lessons were just like story lessons to me at school, which is why I liked them so much.
Next was maths. Moving on to geometric solids today. We used these links,
animated nets
3 dimensional figures
before going on to the textbook.
Then we did spelling. This will be a once a week thing now, inshAllah, testing 16 spellings at a time. (Taken from a book listing words by age group).
After lunch and zuhr they did their daily Quran work. After that we started a Hands of a Child lapbook on plants. Lastly they did 15 minutes each on the Rosetta Stone Pashto.
Ia kept to her usual timetable. We are still working on the 5 Pillars of Islam Lapbook. It is not really a long lapbook, but I am doing other work around the topic with her at the same time. I am going through the files of work done by R and J at this age and pulling out worksheets and booklets which I can reuse or copy for Ia. This week Ia is learning about the salaah.
U insisted that she should have a timetable of her own. The thing is that she has no intention of carrying it out, she just wants to see it stuck on the wall with her name on it.
Today I played a maths game with U. Ia joined in.The girls had to cover their eyes then listen to me drop cubes into a metal dish, and count how many I dropped in by counting the sounds. Then they could check by counting the cubes. U can easily do this counting, however she decided that she should be the one counting aloud and I should drop the cubes on her cue. When she found that the number of cubes in the dish did not match the number she had counted up to she was not impressed, saying that I had been playing the game wrongly!
U certainly has her own ideas, maashAllah, and HE with her is a new and different experience for me!
New post added yesterday to Always Learning Resources.

More snow

More snow today and the kids were keen to go out in it again, in fact today they spent a long time outside. I had thought to do some work today, but in the end, with H unable to go to work again, it just felt like a day off. So, it was. The three of them trudged off to the mosque for jummah.

In the afternoon I got some help with baking a chocolate cake, then went on to get the rest of the baking done.

I've been discussing timetabling again with the boys. R helped me come up with a reorganized plan for the week. It is now almost half way through this academic year, so a good time to look at what we've been doing.

Shall we call this reading week?

More fresh snow, but the novelty seems to have worn off and no one wanted to go out to play in it.

More reading and reading today. Other work got done, just about. Ia and U did lots of colouring in their make and colour books.

Reading, reading

This morning we set off over icy pavements, warm sun in our faces, to the library! The visit was well overdue. The boys have reread just about everything in the house on their reading level, and we needed the exercise! When we got there they all settled down to read in the library, in such a hurry they were to read new books! Ia chose some early reader type books for the first time. She was proud to be choosing books to read herself. U found a collection of Thomas the Tank Engine books. She does love a series of books. You can place a series in a neat stack, and then settle down to go through them one by one. Of course reading has been quite a feature of the rest of the day too.
After coming home and having lunch we spent a couple of hours on our daily HE work.
Also today was another newsagent treat day, as R has memorised Surah Bayyinah. J completed memorising it today too, so looks like more cash to be shelled out tomorrow. Alhamdulillah.
Welcome to readers who have recently added themselves to the followers list. Zed28, you have a mysteriously empty blogger profile! You are most welcome to leave a comment!

Reading

The boys got a walk with H this morning, and play time in the garden again with Ia.
While they were out I worked with Ia. She is getting confident with her reading and writing now, maashAllah. She is trying to read her story books, rather than just readers, and although she often asks me for words she persists with it, so in time it should click, inshAllah. At the weekend she decided to write a letter to her cousin, and today she wanted to do her sentence writing without me looking, and she did well with it maashAllah.
Recently the boys have been rereading all their fiction books, but they've almost got through them all now, so we'll need to get something done about that!
U continues to be a keen reader, maashallah. (Of course she can't actually read!) She spends a couple of hours a day by herself reading piles of books. She prefers to be undisturbed during this time, as she likes to read aloud, with no one listening/interrrupting.
I did quite a bit of reading aloud to the boys today too,covering several subjects. I really should try to keep a note of what we are reading, at least the non-fiction and read aloud fiction. I couldn't keep up with the rest of it!

Still winter, still home!

J's foot is better, U has recovered from her weekend bug,alhamdulillah, but we are still home, because it snowed! Anyway, they all went out to enjoy it, and made snow castles with buckets and spades, charged about and threw snowballs.

But it was too cold to stay out for long, and back inside we continued our usual HE day, until feeling warm and ready enough to venture back outside.

The boys did English composition, and more fractions, Pashto, Quran and some science. Between me reading to them and them reading alone we also finished the archeology book.

Ia's was all routine work, plus we are getting back on with the five pillars lapbook now that the About Me is finished.

A couple of weeks ago I posted a little about timetable. The thing with me is that as soon as I devise a timetable I change it again. I tweak and adjust continually, so anything I blog about timetables will go slightly out of date very shortly. What continues is the existence of a timetable. I've been looking ahead recently too, into how other home educators approach secondary HE, and what I'm reading is bound to have an influence on the way I organise. I'm not suggesting it is time for me to shift style now, I just like to see what I may need to consider in future. As long as HE still remains an option in the UK, of course.

In the meantime, let them play in the snow!