Wanted to note that we borrowed a book called What Uncles Do Best/What Aunts Do Best from the library, and B read through it with K then pointed out to me all the parts in the illustrations where the uncle is doing stereotypically girly things with the child, and the aunt is doing tomboyish stuff. <- ticks the box for "critically examining texts for gender messages".
Ho hum…
So, this week: B was at sixer and seconder training camp on the weekend, and I successfully convinced her to write up a report on it for her portfolio this afternoon. Needs editing and expanding a bit but we nutted out the process of writing quite well, I thought. She’s on the “I can’t write” and “I’m hopeless with words” negative self-talk, and I encouraged her to tell me about it, and then think about what she’d want to include from that conversation, then give it a bit of structure. She wrote the first paragraph then I took dictation after she started panicking and losing focus, as I figured I’d rather she worked through her inhibitions around the process of composition without worrying about typing and spelling as well.
We stayed home yesterday as I couldn’t get organised enough to get out the door for pottery plus ew started out grumpy and snarling at each other, and it went downhill from there. Sigh. Today was much nicer. Since B has a cold from a camping weekend in rain and snow, she didn’t go riding yesterday or swimming today, but K went swimming with Nannie and B pottered about and snuggled with me and H. We had declared a screentime moratorium for the week, so we’ve actually been forced to interact, quelle horreur!
She’s reading more, and has gotten three chapters into The Far Side of the Mountain: the sequel to My Side of the Mountain. We had a chat this morning about the process of reading, and she was saying that when she doesn’t understand a word she reads on and works it out from context – yay! She’s got it at last! We also chatted about the way vocabulary expands from reading because of the context and the motivation, whereas vocabulary workbooks are a waste of time because they provide an artificial context and no intrinsic motivation. She probably just tuned me out, though… 😉
I’ve been reading aloud more – a book on dreams which K keeps asking me to reread, Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats for B, and Winnie the Pooh for both of them. Plus random books for K, stories as well as those “first words” type picture books which I’ve been having fun with by talking complete gibberish with a straight face, and watching her pick up on my gambit, then start playing it herself. She’s getting into telling jokes and watching her work out the idea of humour is absolutely fascinating. B is getting in on the act by reading aloud from her joke book as well. Lots of awful howlers!
Last week – we forgot Scouts on Wednesday but she did make it to Cubs on Friday. She did pottery, German, swimming and horse riding as per the usual timetable. Apparently she now has her Pets badge at Cubs. I’m sure we did lots of other stuff but I’m too brainburned to remember them, will come back and fill this post in if I remember anything of note…
Friday was a bit of a write-off and we spent most of the day in pyjamas (except B, who rugged up and rode in the rain up to the shops to buy bread, the hero!). B obligingly let me have a three hour nap with Da Boy in the afternoon, after which I felt much refreshed (although I still went to bed at 9pm). The rest of the time there was playing in the playroom, which I had cleared a bit further, watching TV, and playing in the rain. K and I had a boffer fight and then got into the dress-ups, so H and K were fetchingly attired in hats and other accoutrements when Daddy got home! B had Cubs, and when she came back informed me that she’s going to try to do about four badges simultaneously. Odd girl! One of them is the literature badge, although she hadn’t registered that it asked to read books by *six separate authors* instead of just *six books*, which she was already congratulating herself on having achieved with the My Secret Unicorn books. But I pointed out that she’s already most of the way there with the various things she’s been reading that weren’t MSU, so I think she’s decided to go ahead with it after all…
On Saturday I finished digging out the playroom and we vacuumed every inch of it. I settled in to clear out and rearrange all the books on the shelves, and since it looked like an all day job E took the munchkins off to the Malkara Scale Model Exhibition by himself for a couple of hours (see picture post). I pulled out all the books from the non-fiction shelves and rearranged them by KLA (how un-unschooly – don’t tell anyone!). In the process I found lots of forgotten treasures. I also managed to put away most of the books which had been sitting in piles on the shelves and other flat surfaces. B decided to declutter all the Goosebumps books which aren’t choose-your-own-adventures, which made some more space for paperbacks. I found Fantastic Mr Fox for B, which I was pretty sure she hadn’t read, and put it out for her, so she took that to bed and has read half of it already (look – another book for her literature badge!). I also found one of the tangrams puzzles and asked B to put it together so the pieces wouldn’t fall out of the box, so she did one of them. I also pulled out a number of books for K, who was up very late because she’d had a two hour nap in the afternoon, so needed a lot of entertaining in the evening *yawn*
This morning K and I got up early together, and did some music in front of the heater. I played Twinkle Twinkle Little Star on the bells and she accompanied me on the drum in perfect rhythm. Then we just experimented with making sounds for a while. B got up after reading in bed, and got on the computer. K has been playing with the safari animals, and now has the vintage wooden “professions” puzzle out, although I don’t think H’s assistance is really all that helpful… The plan for the day is that K and B will go out to the farm, and be back later tonight, so it’s about time to get K dressed and ready to go!
ETA: They had a lovely time out with Nannie and Pa, and B rang to squeak excitedly about having cantered and then galloped on Smoko! Then they went to Hall and B rode Sylvia while K played at the playground with Pa, but they had to come home earlier than expected because B came down with a headache. Panadol doesn’t appear to have made much of a difference, and she doesn’t appear to have any type of fever, so we’re wondering if it might be that she’s developing migraines (poor little scrap). She’s had one or two mysterious headaches before, so it could be…
So B curled up miserably on the couch, and K wanted to watch TV but the noise was irritating B, so we tucked K into her bed with E’s computer and Monsters Inc. H and I had gone to the markets before lunch, and I found organic free range eggs marked down to $2 per dozen, so now I have 3 dozen to use up! I hard boiled nine of them, and now have two quiches (one destined for the freezer) and a pastry shell for lemon meringue pie in various stages of preparation. K came out in time to help me with the quiches, which really meant steal the ingredients. B went to bed and seems to have gone to sleep.
E took all three munchkins to the Malkara Scale Model Exhibition on Saturday (and left me to reorganise the bookshelves in the playroom). Apparently H was lovely and enjoyed snuggling with his Daddy for the whole time.
There was a small “train” to ride on, although we only got photos of E’s ear when he was trying to take pictures of K behind him, so this one of some anonymous blokes in front will have to do in illustration.
While it would seem that the playground was more interesting that the exhibits, apparently some models were in fact seen (although K claims not to remember any of them!).
B really liked the bakery shop and the train exhibits. She’s not sure which one was her favourite train exhibit.
Next time we should probably let her go off with a camera as well 🙂
I got up earlier than all my munchkins this morning and saw off my Beloved to work for once (although there was not enough smooching for a rare child-free time, Beloved – let’s do better next time!). H was the first to get up, about 8:30, and whinged about before presenting me with an enormous poo (gee, thanks). B was reading in bed as usual before she got up a bit before 9. She did some times tables exercises, using me as a timer, then settled in to do some fluffy ‘putering before the 10 o’clock shut off time. K came downstairs about 9:30 and watched Playschool before sharing porridge for breakfast with H. H proved to be Extremely Fond of porridge, and also of mugging me for the spoon. The TV is still on, with the option for K to watch the two junior PS shows For the Juniors and Our Animals, but the computers are shutting…down…now…
Today was a staying-at-home-and-doing-laundry kind of a day. E had put up my retractable clothesline under cover on the deck last night, so I filled that up, and the racks, and half the Hills Hoist. Hurrah for clean socks! H had a bit of a nap, from around 11ish, but was awake for the rest of the time and spent most of it eating. He’s a definite fan of this food business, that boy. K pottered, played in the garden, watched a couple of Playschool episodes, and brought me books to read. I listed some more books on JB and made another $50. I felt inspired to cook, so tried a newly tweaked bread recipe in the machine, and started making a meat and vege pie at about 4. K got very grumpy with me because I had said I was making a cake, then got involved in making bread and pie instead, so she flumped off to watch TV.
B came home a bit before 5ish, talked about wanting to do music lessons, and then exploded when I asked what she was planning to stop doing so we could pay for them *sigh* Then she got distracted with wanting to arrange something with Caitlin so she could get to sports next term. Which is affordable (it’s only about $30-40 per term) but awkward given that it’s at the other side of town. It may be possible to arrange for her to come back on the bus with E; we shall see… She had a long chat with Caitlin, including looking up songs on Youtube on my computer, then exploded when she realised that she’d missed the first half of Rollercoaster and the DVD player had been left on so had not recorded it… There were more explosions, which escalated to bullying K and screaming in H’s ear, at which I exploded also, and it all went Very Nasty for a moment or two. Then B complained that somehow it was because she kept trying to talk to me and I wasn’t listening…um? Try turning off the TV, putting down the phone, and getting away from the ‘puter, and then tell me that 😉 Fortunately E came home at that point, having forgotten that he should have been at a Baronial meeting, so there was a bit of a circuit-breaker.
E took the girls off to take B to her first Scouts meeting, and I put H to bed. B is in the process of moving up from Cubs to Scouts, which means she’ll now be going to both Wednesday and Friday meetings for a while. When they got back, E was reading to K in her bed when they heard the rat trap go off, but upon investigation there were no dead rodents and no peanut butter either, so who knows…? He reset it and put it back up again, and hopefully we will see some success with this method and then not have to escalate it to poison. I went out to collect B at 9, as K was still having stories and songs, and she seemed to have had a lot of rather rough fun, and to have at least one friend there. It will be interesting to see how co-ed scout groups go as the kids get a little bit older, really… We got back in time for B to watch some of The Gruen Transfer, then a recording of Dr Who and Dr Who Confidential, then off to bed!
B had another email exchange with her penpal this morning, and sent her a picture of Smoko (what else). I asked for breadmaking advice on one of my forums, and experimented with adding less water to the usual recipe. The loaf turned out to be very dense but not sunken, so somewhere between that point (~325mL) and the usual 415mL will probably work.
The girls had a dentist appointment at 10:30 this morning (so I missed the JB meet, boo hiss). We were running late, as usual, so I dropped B off outside the dental rooms, and when I’d found a park and unloaded the younger two, she was already in with the dentist. K had her check up as well, and apparently they have beautiful teeth and are very polite and good at sitting quietly in the chair, which is probably because they are homeschooled so aren’t picking up bad habits from all the other kids. That dentist is a funny old stick at times. The girls were each given a voucher (“bravery certificate” – puke) for MacDonalds, but B accidentally got two, and – although she herself suggested it the first time – got very upset when I told her to save them for her lunches on Mondays so that I wouldn’t have to give her any money on those days. Amazingly we managed to sort it out without coming to blows or kicking her out of the car to walk home, I must be on the upside of my being-a-complete-bitch cycle at the moment 😉
We paid a quick trip to the op shop in the same centre, and then came home a bit less than an hour before Nannie was coming to pick them up for swimming. B had lunch, hunted up all her books and got upset because she couldn’t find one (which apparently was everybody’s fault but hers), then sat down to do some more crocodile research on my computer. K watched another Play School episode, then we got everybody fed and ready for swimming.
While they were out, I mowed the carpet and cleaned the living room again, then started sorting laundry, then H decided he had to go to sleep on my knee. Unfortunately he woke up when I tried to transfer him to bed, and whinged for the next half hour, which was a bit hard to take. K came home very tired and whingy too, and is watching the afternoon Play School episode, while H is pootling about under B’s desk in the playroom. B has headed off to the farm, and will be back tomorrow afternoon.
B still didn’t have a computer this morning but she used mine to check her email before pottery. She had a message from her new JL penpal, Natti, and she had time to write back before we had to leave. In the car on the way to pottery I had a brainwave and asked her if she would make me hanging medallions and beads for my mobiles, which she was extremely enthusiastic about, especially when I mentioned my idea of a market stall and the possibility of making some money out of it! She made beads at the class today, she tells me.
We were prepared for her to catch the bus between pottery and German, but Mum’s doctor’s appointment in the same suburb ended early so she swung past and picked B up just as the bus was coming down the street! She took her to have lunch at Maccas before German. K, H and I had playgroup, then went into the library to wait for B. K borrowed five books, including The Elephant and the Bad Baby 🙂
When we got home B played in the garden for ages, while K watched Playschool and I cooked lunch (risotto). Nannie came back again around three but Jackie had decided it was too cold to go riding, so Nannie just stayed and played with the kids for half an hour or so. There was some pretty non-stop TV watching from 3:30-6, then B and K went on my computer while I cooked dinner. K started out playing Elmo’s Keyboard-o-rama, then they explored lots of other games on the Sesame Street site. In the meantime E had fixed B’s computer, so she went back on there after dinner. K pottered about, had a shower, and then cut off most of her hair again while sitting in front of the heater to dry off… Galoot!
B had her tree-planting thingie in the morning, while I did laundry and cleaned the living room, and E took K off to the park. When they got back, B putered for a while, then came and joined me and K when I got out the beading supplies. K threaded a necklace onto fishing line, and B made a beautiful wire and bead creation in shades of green. We had to put it all away eventually after H got too impatient with having to stay in the family room with Daddy instead of the living room with all the interesting shiny things! There was something of a kerfuffle over B not helping out when asked in the evening, but eventually she did put away all the washing up and hunt up the dirties. She helped K navigate around Starfall while I put H to bed, then it was time for The Gruen Transfer, Dr Who and Dr Who Confidential (with dinner in there somewhere too), and early to bed for all of them!
Well, this is hardly much of a record of our home ed journey is it? *blush*
Since it was the first week of term 3, pottery and German were not back yet, so we had a quiet day at home on Monday. K and B played in the garden and made a cubby house in the dungeon. They set up some paint on the deck and made foot-paintings on cardboard, then later on did some collage at the kitchen table. Mum came in and took both girls swimming at lunchtime, and H and I went to the post office and (briefly) to SVDP. I flung furniture around in the living room, and got pissed off at the amount of TV the girls were watching, so arranged it as to make it a lot harder to automatically watch when they got bored. We pretty much stuck to minimal TV watching during the day, and me turning my computer off as well, for the rest of the week. We got a postcard from California from the unschooling postcard swap group.
On Tuesday B got stuck into her workbooks again in the morning, and went out to the farm in the afternoon.
Wednesday she did the usual spread of work with Nannie, went riding, and came home excited about doing a research project on crocodiles, so sat at the computer taking notes. Dunno where that came from! K, H and I went to a JB meet in the morning, had lunch with E, and made another trip to the post office. B cooked tuna pasta for dinner (with some help from E) because H fell asleep on my lap just as I was about to get dinner on.
Thursday B worked on her crocodile project, did some more workbooks, and we made yet another trip to the post office! Grandmoogi visited in the morning then went to a meeting and came back in the afternoon and stayed for dinner. B watched the Catalyst show “Don’t Die Young”.
On Friday we went to Black Mountain Tower, then the Botanic Gardens, partly because I’d promised them we’d go to the tower ages ago, and partly so I could collect tourist brochures for the unschooling swap at JL. B went riding with Nannie in the afternoon. For a change, we did NOT have to go to the post office 😉 B went to cubs in the evening.
On Saturday morning, B and I went to the farmers’ markets in the morning, then Nannie took both girls out to the farm, where B rode Smoko (and came home literally bouncing with excitement that she had cantered and jumped with him) and K sat on Smoko, made friends with Sarah (2 year old neighbour) and went for a long walk with Pa. I went off to the mall, went to the bank and (you guessed it!) the post office, and bought some more beads. I started work on new suncatcher dangles, one of which is for the JL swap, and the other as yet unknown (but possibly destined for The Morrigan).
Tomorrow we have B’s tree-planting thing in the morning, and as yet no plans for the afternoon…
B seems to be reading her Futurama comic when she goes to bed, although she’s been getting up late so is presumably doing some reading in the mornings, too. I’m re-reading the Cadfael mystery “The Rose Rent”, since I have to do something with no computer and there’s only so much non-stop housework I can take. K is reading off letters from environmental print and asking all sorts of questions like “What does this word mean?” 😀 She’s also been playing with blocks and acting out little stories with them (eg. one was a dog and one was a person looking for her lost dog, who asked a talking tree which helped her find the dog, etc). And she has watched a couple of the lower primary shows like For the Juniors, Our Animals and Count Us In. B also watched a bit of schools TV, mostly BTN and science shows, and some shows in the evening like Spicks and Specks.