Friday 25 January 2013

This week so far.

An interesting week:

Building vehicles out of treeblocks:  this is a steam engine.

Attacking boats with new remote controlled dragons, (that have an incredibly LOUD roar)

 Sleeping until midday in my bed.

A drawing of "Us all together"  :-)

A plane flying over a mountain and a mushroom house.

More building........

And trying not to look at my poor lounge...lol.

This week we have also read "How Big is a Million" and Rye can read a lot of it himself.
He has followed the Yoga pretzel cards, and I think he's managed to read some of the positions because he got the names right, and not all are obvious!  And it's been a while since we did any yoga!
He's practised writing his letters on an ap on the iphone.
He's watching a new animation about robots.
He's built towers and all manner of things with the tree blocks.
We went to soft play yesterday, and he made friends with 4 new boys to the group ranging from about 5-8yrs.
They played football together, they raced around, spun on roundabout, filled the ball sucker right up and then lay under it when all the balls are released, until they are hidden under balls. 

And today, well so far today, we've talked about Astronaughts, planets, rockets, talked about how to make someone better when they are unconscious (it was an alternative to everyone dying in their imaginative games lol); and lets just say my son and mindee are not two people you want treating you!  Apparently they would need screw drivers and a hammer!!

Sometimes, just sitting down and looking at what I can remember, has been played during a week, makes me realise there is a lot of learning going on; there's the easily recognisable; writing and reading; but look closely there's exercising imagination, conceptualising pictures into structures, vehicles etc.  Social skills are been practised and learned.  Fine and gross motor skills refined through the art, and playing things like football.  Rye when building his towers became very distressed because the rug is less stable than on the laminate floor.  So we talked about how he would have to experiment to see what would make his structures more stable, and so he did and he ultimately was successful in building his towers.

His drawing is becoming more complex and imaginative; sure the mechanics of drawing is a little immature; but I like the stories that come with; and that alone is the skill of narration.

How does the classical education fit in?  Well, autonomously, which I guess would be alien to Susan Wise-Bauer and her mother; works for us though; Rye is practising memory skills, remembering poems, the books have pointed me toward some excellent reference resources and story books; like the excellent Sir Cumference books; which introduce mathematical concepts in a fun way through story telling.  And the Bob books are excellent for beginner readers to gain confidence!   The history books are great too; the work book isn't the most exciting I've seen; so I have jazzed up the activities - but what I love best, is rather than jumping straight into say learning about the Romans; the History of the World (1st volume) explains what history is first.

And I feel keenly the gaps in my education.  I may be University level educated; yet until I home educated I'd not  heard of "diagraph" .  Grammer, never taught, picked up from reading books, mathematical terms are goobleygook to me.   I have no plans to sit down and drill Rye on these things, but I do want to introduce the terms/concepts to him.


4 comments:

nocton4 said...

Wonderful read, go you and top little lad Rye x

Nell said...

Just wanted to say that your blog is lovely! I stumbled across it by chance and I am enjoying reading about your HE journey. We celebrate the same feasts and would (often for the sake of convenience) describe ourselves as 'pagan' - what tradition do you follow?

Joxy34 said...

Cheers hun.


Thank you Nell. My tradition is best describe as eclectic soliary witchcraft. I'm not Wiccan, but I do like the Wheel of the Year and enjoy celebrating the festivals; as do most Pagans these days :-) My main interests are Northern traditions and British folklore. I like to get to know the land/area I live and tune myself to that landscape, so my practices are linked to how I feel the landscape wants me to interact with it. I'm open to traditions tnough, I'll happily blot away with Heathen friends, help raise energy with Wiccan friends, or participate in their rituals to celebrate festivals and their gods.

Nell said...

Sounds wonderful! I don't like to restrict myself to one particular tradition either and I do think that it makes sense to attune yourself to the landscape in which you live.