Dinosaurs & Squirrels

Over the last few evenings we decided to follow a great idea that was featured on a facebook page I use, involving toy dinosaurs. https://medium.com/thoughts-on-creativity/6f4cb1886d41
It features placing toy dinosaurs in situations where it looks as though they have been causing trouble over night.
You could knock it as non educational and just for fun but it's actually led to discussions about particular dinosaurs. Mostly the stegosaurus as H noted that we didn't have one in our toy collection.  This has led to worksheets, colouring and watching some videos on the natural history museum website and discovering that the first complete dinosaur skeleton in the world was actually discovered here in the UK not far from us.

Scelidosaurus

http://www.nhm.ac.uk/nature-online/life/dinosaurs-other-extinct-creatures/dino-directory/scelidosaurus.html

Some of the places the kids found the dinosaurs each morning.

We spent this morning at C's football match and while he was warming up we went for a stroll down to the village. On our way we stopped to watch the squirrels.

As always we visited the pet shop, must be one of M's favourite ways to spend some time. After playing on the park, messing about in the leaves and holding what seemed to be an awful lot of ladybirds, C finished his game with a win.

Off home to warm ourselves up with some beans on toast and spend the rest of the day playing indoor football, lego, games and watching tv. 

Winter is here

I always know when winter has properly settled in as none of us are all that keen on venturing out of the house. It has been very much a week of indoor activities.

We've had lots of minecraft homeschool, they completed all their tasks on time ready to start next weeks tasks. Plenty of den building and role play, construction in the form of lego, wooden bricks and even the duplo came out which I though they had perhaps outgrown.
The boys read a book to me between them and I've noticed a vast improvement in how fast they can read and the words they know. So that was a proud mummy moment.

We have watched films and I read the entire new Wimpy Kid book in 2 evenings to them. They could have read it themselves but they still enjoy me reading to them and I did cry with laughter at the book. That seems to have happened with all of the books in the series.

Lots of art going on, I have piles of colourings and drawings everywhere.

We have spent time working through body sticker books with all 3 of them. M finds it all fascinating.
The usual swimming lessons, jujitsu and football have gone on.

We baked cookies together and played on education city.

We did venture out to go shopping one day and spent the entire journey and some time sat in the car park talking about politics, interest rates and inflation which C especially enjoyed.

Some ramblings from our week!

Tomorrow we are off to stand in the cold to watch C play football and probably end up on the park too.

Penpals and name writing

Although we had a day at home we had a pretty productive day. The boys spent some time writing to their new penpals. H's penpal lives in Ireland and C's lives in Georgia in the USA. They have only just started writing and the kids are also home schooled. It gives them some letter writing practice whilst making it a little more fun and interesting for them.

They have learnt where the address goes and how to set out a letter. Also writing the address on the envelope is not something either of them have had to really do before.

They have spent quite a bit of the day on and off the mincecraft homeschool server. I have been keeping a close eye on it as I'm finding it quite interesting too. 

M has spent a lot of the day playing with her farm and animals, this afternoon the kids decided to make some role play game up in the kitchen which meant that I lost all my clothes drying racks as they were being used as a barrier. There were cushions and duvets and enough extras that made me not want to venture out there. I left them to it as they were all playing so well together and you can't put a price on the educational value of plain old playing! 

I have spent any spare time clearing out cupboards in preparation for xmas and getting through what seems to be a gigantic washing pile again. Every time I think I am winning the battle it comes back with a vengeance. 

H spent his evening at jujitsu while C went to the shops with dad. M spent the evening on education city and bin weevils.

Almost forgot to mention that M wrote her own name for the first time today. I wrote each letter separately and then she had a go on her own. It was readable even though 1 letter was sideways and dad was very impressed when I sent him a picture of it while he was at work :-) 

Victorians & Soft Play

I'm not going to pretend to remember what happened to Weds & Thurs last week, we would have done some educational things but I have what is known as a brain like a sieve. However we had a really nice time on Friday. The boys were signed up to a Victorian workshop at the town museum for two hours which I'm sure was educational! It had a lower age cut off point and as M was too small to go we opted to go around the shops. We went back to the museum so M could have a look around, she does love the place even though we have been lots of times before.

One of the boys friends birthday treats was to then go on to a soft play centre for the afternoon. We were there for many hours until we had to call it a day and go home for dinner.

Weekend was full of sport clubs for the boys and gardening.


Monday's science/craft group was quite low on numbers, they all built marshmallow and spaghetti structures for science and then we went on to do emotional art paintings.

When we got home the boys spent the afternoon on their first instalment of minecraft homeschool. I'm already loving it, they are set certain tasks to be completed by the end of the week. This weeks tasks are to watch a documentary on the Severn wonders of the ancient world, which they have done. Then to take a quiz on it. Now they are starting the in game parts to the assignment for the week, which is to build their houses before starting on the really good stuff!

M spent that time with me making a little picture out of a pull out that came with a Boden catalogue which had arrived in the post.  

Loo rolls

Definitely a chill out day today, lots of toys were got out which is why the living room looks like a bomb has hit it. Will attempt to clean it after writing this!
The kids did some painting, H decided to use some of the pizza bases to paint pizzas on which I thought was a great idea. We have a huge ton of loo rolls which would be a shame to throw out so decided to look up some loo roll crafts. Amazing how many things you can do with them. I particularly like the look of some of the Xmas decorations.

After falling out with the council we spent the evening clearing our allotment by torchlight ready to hand the keys back. I won't bore you with the details other than it was a difference of opinion on what a plot should look like this time of year! I don't see a problem having it covered with plastic sheeting when nothing is growing. I have a feeling they are trying to win allotments of the year or some other rubbish award. After having the allotment for what must be 7 years I am very disappointed with the whole thing but also relieved in a way. At least I won't have to keep to their standard any more. The boys were never really that enthusiastic about it and M can always grow stuff at home in the garden with me so I can get my veg growing fix another way and she won't miss out. We have to go back down tomorrow night for a bonfire and to say goodbye :-(

New group

Well the weekend went in a blur as always, consisted of football, jujitsu, visiting a venue for my birthday party and a long trip to Wooky hole!

No time to recover, I spent any spare time over the weekend printing and finishing off the plans for Mondays group. This was a new home ed group which I had the madness to set up and run. The only benefit of doing it myself was that I could choose things that I know my lot would like to do.

After leaving the house early to go and collect the parcels which I needed for the group from the sorting office and collecting the keys we finally got to the hall.
Setting up didn't take too long, bit of table Jenga going on.
The session was based on Italy/Ancient Rome bit of a history and geography combo. I had made up a display about Italy with some pictures and facts on. I'd put a map up too so they could find Italy.
First session we made clay Roman plates or bowls with air drying clay and I had put little info cards out about Roman foods.

We then had a break for lunch, it was an early lunch as the timings for each activity need to be worked on a little I think.
After tidying up we went on to make pasta mosaic pictures and again a little info card about mosaics.

Then to round it off we made leaning tower of Pisas out of toilet roll tubes and pizza bases in small groups.

Overall the kids seemed to enjoy the activities, there was a few chaotic moments though which I expect will get ironed out over time and slight adjustments to timings will help. Although the work load is quite big it would be nice to have a regular monthly group so hopefully it works out.

Intech

Having waited for a good few weeks now to actually be free on one of Intechs home educator days we were looking forward to going.
Intech is a science centre and planetarium in Winchester for anyone who doesn't know. The centre decided over the summer that they would offer one day a month for home edders to get in for the school rate with adults free. No need to take a big group so you can just go as a family. The only problem with this for us is that if you miss that day for whatever reason illness, busy etc then you need to wait another 4 weeks. Unless you really want to pay the normal entry prices!

They have changed quite a few of the displays since we last went a few years ago. The idea of the place is to have lots of hands on science activities for the kids to play on and hopefully learn a thing or two.

We were there for much of the day along with lots of schools which made getting on some of the equipment a little awkward at times. Overall worth a trip to a couple of times a year and we will go back again at some point as we didn't go in to see any of the planetarium shows today.

M leanring about fosils. 

Playing with a big fan and a parachute man! 

Home Day

It's nice sometimes to have a day at home and not have to go out anywhere. I do like the odd day off so we can do more 'work' at home. 

We started the day off setting up the new Minecraft Homeschool accounts and getting all the equipment set up so we are ready for when the classes start. 

I found the page on Facebook a few weeks ago and read a little about it and liked the look of it. For anyone who plays Minecraft like my boys do. It is basically a five week course. Each week the kids are given coursework to complete before the Friday. The class they wanted to do was the 7 wonders of the ancient world. They will work in teams on a passworded server with another 9 kids in their group to build one of these wonders and they will also be given offline work to complete. The boys are really looking forward to it and I think after a few hours messing about with logins and accounts we are all set to go. 

The rest of the day disappeared doing 'things' around the house. Playing and crafting mostly. 

Remember, Remember

Well Tuesday was all about bonfire night, we spent the whole morning reading our book on the Gunpowder plot. It's only an old one I picked up from one of the library sell offs at some point but it's very good and not too in depth and I read it every year to refresh the kids.
We then went on to do lots of worksheets on Guy Fawkes, which we printed off from http://www.activityvillage.co.uk/bonfire-night

After that we made some sparklers by dipping chocolate fingers into hot water and then sprinkles.

Some educational games on the PC and then before we knew it time for hot dogs and a few fireworks in the garden.

Helicopters

Today was home ed group, the morning started off chaotic as always when we need to be out of the door by a certain time. First session for my older science group involved making paper helicopters. We experimented with different weights and length of blades. Then had a go with other types of paper and card. Was pretty good fun.

The younger group were working on their own versions of a Jackson Polock. Then they had a go at decorating biscuits with chocolate and sweets. They were meant to look like bonfires. It wasn't long before the older ones joined in with that one too!

After a break the older ones went on to decoupage their shoe boxes. While the younger ones had a very quick go at making noises with different objects. Stones in bottles etc

After group we went on for a spot of late lunch down by the beach. Then off home for a rest. Later in the evening H went to jujitsu and after that they all did some painting. H did a brilliant job of painting a tree :-)

C started and finished his assessment on maths whizz and turns out he's not as far behind as I thought he was in terms of average age assessments. I'm not keen on testing but the games help to pinpoint where more work is needed which I think is just what we need. He is more of a visual learner so it seems to suit him.

Lots of bonfire night work planned for tomorrow.

Halloween

As predicted we have been pretty busy this week. We still had family down Mon/Tue so we spent most of our time with them. Ice skating, a visit to the aquarium, dinner out. I cooked for 13 people one night! Was a real squeeze at the kitchen table but we managed it.
In between seeing family the kids have seen friends with it being half term.

We've been den building, pumpkin carving, face painting and trick or treating.
Had some tears over Maths from 'C' so looking into other ways of getting it done as the worksheet method just doesn't suit him. He thinks he's failed it before he has even read it!

Football for 'C' and for a change me and the hubby had a night out with friends, very rare indeed. So we all went out for breakfast this morning, now finishing off the garden project before the start of a more normal week again.