My new reading library

I am not sure if it is just my kids or if all kids are completely incapable of returning books neatly to shelves. It seriously drives me nuts. And since we own so many books, I really just love books, it is a really big problem in this house. I constantly have the teetering tower of books toppling over and spilling all over the floor.

And so my solution has been found at bunnings for $70, not cheap but still a lot cheaper than other solutions, and I have made great use of an odd little space. In such a small room it feels great to use this little space. The specs:

1. 5 x deep shelving baskets
2. 1 x 1600mm bracket
3. 1 x pack of screws, I got size 8G x 35mm

The kids have gone on a reading spree AND all books have been returned neatly. Woohoooooooo finally a solution. They can't reach the top basket yet so up there are the books they cannot yet read by themselves. I am sure chairs will be use in the not to distant future to reach those ones though. Loving my new shelves.

Cleaning up for the new year

Found the motivation, energy and ideas to clean up and rearrange the learning space to make it more usable next year.

I learnt a lot about what I need last year:

1. I need much much more space for books
2. I need to be able to SEE the resources I have, that means plastic tubs not blue fabric boxes. If I cannot see it I don't use it.So much resources were wasted last year because I simply forgot I owned them.
3. I need more space for desks. They were too squished in and I had trouble reaching them all to help them.
4. I need a better system for the readers. The kids have no idea how to put books away. I have a plan for these stay tuned (they are all currently in a box on the floor.
5. I will no longer be storing the spare bed in here, sorry kids that will now be stored in your bedroom, there is just not enough room in here when all 5 of us squish in.
6. I need the computer set up in here and not in the external study/sewing room.

And so here is the almost complete room. There is still a big box of things I need to rehome. A pile of empty tubs to find a home for till they are needed. The box of books that need shelving, the workbooks that I need to think of a system for and the mattress since MIL will be coming to stay in a week (I am undecided if I rehome the mattress or find somewhere to store it here. It has been very useful and a lovely spot to nap in the heat.

Newly claimed space this wardrobe was full of cloth nappies. I have heaps I need to re home.

The bottom right blue box is empty, the cardboard box is scrap paper so will eventually be an empty hole too. Yay for spare space.

 My current favourite shelf. These science books have me excited.

Waiting

The hardest thing about homeschooling is the waiting and trusting. Trusting that your child does intrinsically want to learn. They will learn and it is ok to wait for it. This has been my biggest lesson this year.

We started off all engines blazing, everyone was keen Mr I was excited. He was soaking up the learning quicker than I could produce it. Then one engine blew and another, ending with us running on one spluttering small engine for some time. There was very little he would agree to do. He wouldn't read me a book, I couldn't find anything he would agree to read. So in any work he did agree to do I made him read the questions, any time he was faced with a word he wanted to know I made him try.

Finally a month ago after months of waiting. He picked up his early reader bible and read. He sat there and read, and he has read every day since. He started the year on level 5 readers we got him to level 8 before he refused to read and now he is on around level 16, which is around what is expected for end of year 1. I am really proud of him and I will be completely unhumble and say I am proud of me too.

This has been a hard year, but as I look back I see he has learnt everything he needed to and everything I wanted him to. I haven't had to sit there with a book and force info down his throat he has just learnt. As I sit here spending hours planning for next year I need to remember it is ok if we don't do even half of it, he will still learn, and hopefully BOS don't look too closely. I wish I didn't feel like I had big brother watching me.

Our Christmas tradition

To me Christmas is a time for giving, not receiving. I won't hide the fact that I am a terrible gift receiver. I always have been. I just don't like it. But I love giving gifts, I love spending the time thinking about it trying to work out what is going to make the person receiving smile. How can I bless their lives.

And so I want to pass this love of giving onto my kids. I also want them to understand that other people may not have everything we have and it is a blessing to us and to them if we give. One way I have found to do this is by donating a Christmas hamper for a family. The kids love shopping and deciding what to buy to make a complete Christmas day for a family. I cannot handle buying prepackaged dried and tinned food so we include a fruit and veg voucher and a butcher voucher. We also buy each child in the family a gift. We don't know who they are and they don't know who we are.

Here is what the kids picked this year

I felt so truly blessed this year when Mr 1 asked if we could make two hampers next year and he would have less presents so we could afford to make two. I share only so you might be challenged to consider doing the same.

Advent photo bomb

Our advent continues to grow...

 I thought this flower looked easy, oh how very wrong I was, it took hours and it still didn't work LOL. It looks pretty enough though. The link if you are game.

 What do you do with personalised Christmas baubles when you no longer have a Christmas tree, well you pin them to fabric behind your nativity.

 As the candles grow it becomes harder and harder to photograph, But it is sort of nice seeing the brightness grow as we get close to Christmas.

 And boy do my kids now how to stage the nativity for photos. I don't ever move anything. I let them arrange and rearrange and add whatever other characters we live. We had a teddy visit the stable today.

The nativity grows

The Kids and I made beeswax candles to add to our advent spiral. I read around people were doing it with primary school classes. I thought it would be easy. Hmm I was tricked. It was really hard to get the kids to roll them tight and straight. While I love giving the kids creative freedom and not making them re-do, I just had to with the candles or they would not work. Mr I was giving the job of measuring the wicks.

We added our tin of bible verses to read each day. Note for future Tracey, reading them randomly out of order doesn't work they need the numbers left on. We used the verses from here Creating the tin, was a great lesson in patterns, we also covered glueing and cutting.

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Day 2 or 3 I've no idea, we have 2 candles though. They kids picked the elephant to add to day. This was our new addition to the collection this year. Our gorgeous set is purchased from Honeybee toys.
I am loving the elephant silhouette in this photo.

I also bought a early reader bible to use. It is a full Bible but worded more simply. Mr I is loving learning how to look verses up.

Start of Advent

  

Since we will be away next week we have started Nativity building early. Normally we would start the 1st December. Our Nativity replaced our Christmas tree last year which we gave away to another family.

We start with little and build the Nativity over the month of December, adding something new each day. This year we will start with Joseph and slowly add other people and animals as we move closer to Christmas. Jesus does not appear in the manger until Christmas morning.

A new addition this year is our advent spiral. Our angel will move forward one spot each day leaving behind a trail of candles. I think it is going to be magical if I can convince the kids to leave the candles alone. I love our new table we will use this year too. The book trays underneath are a perfect place to keep our growing collection of Christmas books (of which none are about the jolly red Santa Clause flying in sleighs).

This year we have built our stable from cardboard following these instructions here it was actually rather easy and I think it turned out well. This is so not a craft for 6, 4 and 2 year olds though. My tip is build ahead without them, then let them paint and decorate.

Police station visit

Last week we were super lucky and got to visit the local police station with our homeschool group. It was so much fun. I expected our visit to last about 10 minutes. But Grant was lovely and spent a whole hour showing the kids around the station and explaining everything to them. He was so patient answering all of their questions as complex or silly as they were.


What did Mr I learn:

1. That you cannot drink while you are driving (yes he told me off for drinking water on the way home LOL).
2. That you cannot chitter chatter on your phone when you are driving.
3. That goal cells are really loud.
4. That the police cars have a screen to tell you messages.
5. That policemen are really nice.

What did I learn:

1. I learnt there are no longer bars on their cells but perspex. The geniuses who designed the cells though added no sound proofing. The poor police officers, it is seriously LOUD when the perspex is kicked.
2. I learnt that there are no guns taken into the processing/charging area
3. I learnt that there is a whole box of keys under the counter in the station, seriously people if you lose your keys it is worth checking the local station.
4. That I now have a mini police officer in my car.

I want to move to Victoria

I have had an epiphany I want to move to Victoria. Trying to fit in the silly rules of the NSW BOS is just abhorent to me. I cannot take it anymore. I have found my feet I know what I want to teach and how I want to teach it. Will he know what all the other year 1 kids know by the end of year 1 well probably not, but he will know different things, and probably more. But the exact topics that are suppose to be taught in year 1 no. Will he know them by the end of primary school most definitely yes. I want to teach in the order that works for us. That is interesting and workable for my family. I started homeschooling so that my children do not have to fit in ridiculously rigid boxes. But I find myself constantly trying to do it. Whether it be in preparation or retrospectively trying to tick off and date the silly boxes. I HATE it I want it to end, it takes all the joy out of schooling. It takes all the learning out of schooling. He doesn't want to do it their way and so he doesn't learn, he completes but he does not learn.

I want to live in our bubble, our beautifully flexible bubble. I want to teach history chronologically. I want to imerse into specific areas of science and study and learn them with true knowledge and understanding and not skim over a million little topics.

My Children will learn, they will learn so so much if the BOS would just let me teach them. And teach them in the ways my children need.

 Today my new textbooks turned up. I had a buy all the books episode a few weeks ago. I was so excited with the new resources I had found I couldn't decide which would be best to use. So I bought them all to read through properly. I found the ones I want to use. But trying to make them fit with the NSW syllabus is making my brain hurt and my heart ache. It should not be this hard. These programs are great.

The only way I can see that works is to double our lessons. Cover the BOS requirements as dirty and as fast as we can. Then sit and enjoy the lessons and things we want to learn. The trouble is this creates so much work for the kids, and so much attitude from having to do the boring things just so I can tick off the boxes. It is not fair.

If you want to see part of my book haul (some are still on the way) read on...

Science

Purposeful design Science.

This book looks like a great holistic approach to science. It looks detailed and interesting. I think we will use this book alongside answers in Genesis next year. There are 83 lessons in the Level 1 book.

Australian Curriculum Science

This is a great box ticker book, it links to the national curriculum BUT not the NSW one which is coded differently and worded so every slightly differently. Do I use this book as well so I can tick the boring boxes. Some of the content looks good. It is not a bad book, I would happily use it but I prefer the other books. This book is offered from Foundation/Kindy through to year 6. There are 40 lessons in the Year 1 book.

Answers in Gensis

This is the first of the 12 books in the Series. It is beautifully presented and I love the immersion style of the book. Focussing on one topic at a time. There are 34 Lessons in this first book.

History

The Story of the World.

Looks well aimed at any primary level, Read to them early on and they can read for themselves later. I am not sure about the activity book that you can buy to go along with it. I am thinking of just reading and discussing them them. Who wants to do a worksheet for everything really. There are 4 volumes and the first has 42 chapters.

The Mystery of History

Wow this book is a big book. Was a little overwhelming at first. There seems to be so much info. I am not sure on this book at the moment. I think it could be used with younger kids but it moves a little slower than SOTW that I think it might be better with older kids. There are 3 volumes and the first volume has 108 lessons.

and this is what all this does to me

We have a new computer and a new baby

The blog became neglected as my computer slowly died. Then as my pregnancy progressed I became incredibly tired and utterly useless after she was born.

We decided on extended school holidays. At 39 weeks pregnant formal schooling got packed away as my friend moved in for 2 weeks. She was hoping to be here for the birth as my support. She arrived when I was 39+6 weeks pregnant and had to leave when I was 42 weeks. Cheeky little miss stayed put till 42+2. It was a lovely birth, but would have been much more special with my friend here.

Little miss was born the last week of NSW term 3 and so our holiday extended another 2 weeks, We started diving back into work when she was 3 weeks old. I won't lie it has been pure utter chaos in our house.  Mud Daddy took over the learning room to sleep in. He was just not functioning at work  with so little sleep. He had a classroom of kids needing him to be working at his best. The department seriously needs to reconsider only offering 1 week of paternity leave. Sending tired daddy's back to work and be responsible for the learning of an entire class on 2 hours sleep is not in the best interests of the students. But we have made compromises for the better of his class. Miss is 7 weeks old and Mud daddy is still sleeping in the learning room on a mattress on the floor.

We are now I would say just this week starting to get back into the swing of life. Starting to feel like I am on top of things. Starting to get just that tiny bit more sleep at night so my life doesn't feel like utter chaos.

We have a new computer, it is so much fun being able to upload and manage photos easily again. Inspires me to restart the blog. Who wants to read a boring blog without pretty pictures to look at. New computers are so much fun. I am determined to keep this one clean and tidy. New filing system, and I will delete emails as I receive them and not wait till there are thousands that need clearing.

And so today we are having a good day as everything settles. We started with Art on the trampoline, ie pavement chalk and they jump and draw.

Then we moved onto maths, reading. Our spelling lesson turned into a maths lesson.

When we were out the other day Mr I found an acronym when were out the other day and wanted to know what the word was. So today we learnt about how to make acronyms. But then as we were using scrabble tiles to do it, things led into a lesson on addition. I expected the lesson to end with making up silly ones and Mr I needing to listen to the beginning sounds.

Then we moved onto some craft making I think stars from the latest CSIRO magazine.

Our day will end with swimming lessons.









And yes Mud Dad who helped create the sheet is a little bit silly

How Mr N our preschooler joined in on the lesson