Home Educating the Puddle Girls…

Thoughts on a first week

Well, i wanted to have a go at the Ambleside Curriculum and we have done a week. So far i am pleased - its not caused any friction, the kids have been happy all week with what they are doing, i suppose i mean Fran by that mostly, and i feel like something of worth has been added without spoiling what was already good. TBH, the “worksheety” element of the last fortnight has had more impact on her, but she is enjoying that too.

That said, we have probably only fitted in half the reading that it suggests in the 4 days we have attempted it. I had some good advice the other day, which was that 6 is fairly young to start, in terms of how the curriculum progresses and that a 6 year old doing yr1 of it, would be out of their depth doing yr3 at age 8. But given that we seem to have only manged half, i reckon i might jiggle it about myself a bit and try to do one “week” per fortnight, with perhaps a Our Island Story and a Bible bit every week. That way we can continue doing all the things we enjoy and if it takes double the length of time, who cares? We have plenty of time!

In actual fact, i didn’t do anything CM’y today with her - i intended to read the Just So story but it didn’t quite happen! However, she did play lots of RR Maths again and has now reached “First Mate” level for some areas, which is second to top. That included fractions of the “find 2/3 of this” when you only have a shape cut into 1/6’s to work with. She did really well with it. Moo spent a long time on Learning Ladder and was much more involved - i saw her listening to stories and playing a letter match game, so that’s good too.

A long time ago i made some worksheets for Fran and today i remembered about them and did them with Moo. They were way too easy for her but we sat together and she had fun. She certainly loved having a bank of something to work through. I was quite pleased though because her big/little less/more words and meanings have been nearly as jumbled as her he/she him/her ones in the past, but clearly she has sorted them out now. So that has inclined me to start finding a slot for something “sit down-ish” with her each day. Before i do that though, i am planning on reviving our Montessori materials and giving them both a good workout with them over the summer. I think they could work together now easily, which will help me organise it. Ammi still sleeps so that gives us a slot for it.

Today Fran got through
3 wordsearches
2x match up (her request again but done with no helping cards today)
the reading book mentioned below

and then last but not least, i printed her off a 100 square which has about 40% of the numbers missing. She filled it all in, completely on her own and worked so hard at her number formation - most impressively it got neater as she went on and by the end all the numbers were not only right, but the right way round and really quite neat and small. It was quite an achievement!

And at that point Ammi woke up so we went off to Tesco for a airmattress/ nappy buying session.

I’ve packed the kids clothes so i had better go and start organising a few other things. The weather looks blooming awful for tomorrow :~(

Stop Press!!!!

Fran just read a book! I sat with her and she made her way through most of an Usborne Early Reader Phonics book - some words she knew, some were quite new (like nest, hatch etc) some she hadn’t encountered for a while and remembered and some she sounded out and picked up really quickly as the book went along.

It was major progress :~) and a good job too as i had just succeeded in making myself cry by reading c/s birth stories to try and believe that i would be okay with that.

Weather reports looking progressively greyer. I’m feelnig a bit depressed by it because i always just feel really responsible for the weather on these occasions. Which is why i don’t make them highly planned affairs because i couldn’t cope with the responsibility!

Well thank goodness that’s over

I hate the disappointment of footbal teams going out of competitions. I don’t like football and i don’t like how much people care about it! It upsets me! *has paddy*

On another note, i emailed yahoo over my problems with getting to my group page. Their response?

“we recommend that you try accessing Yahoo! through a different computer or through a different Internet connection. We also recommend that you contact your Internet Service Provider for further assistance.”

Hmmm.. .well that’s a practical and helpful response! ROFL!!!!

Keeping going.

It was all slightly harder work today but i think that was more my fault than anything as i was feeling a bit tired and overwhelmed by mess. I seem to function better if the house is tidy.

Anyway, i appreciate that “what worksheets i forced my child to do today” doesn’t make the most interesting reading, but i want to keep a record, so i’ll do it in list format today to try not to bore you!

10x match up
10x sums
wordsearch plus BB11 recap and BB12 start.

Her heart wasn’t in it so much today so we called it quits there and moved on. I read her Parables From Nature: A Lesson of Faith and then she narrated it back to me and illustrated it. I actually really like the illustrating idea as a concept because art comes easily to neither of us but this takes the pressure off; we can use the ideas, try it and move on and i think it will be worth having a few different art mediums to explore with it.

I find the idea of guiding a child into being positive with drawing a bit daunting. I must need a book! lol!

Last night Fran spent a long time on that RR Maths game again; she was doing so well with it and tackling quite complex symmetry puzzles, adding and time conundrums too. I’m chuffed with her. I let them both have the preschool learning ladder programme too today; i’ve heard good things about these but *I* find the interface really hard. I need to look at it myself really so i can guide Moo with it more. Still, both enjoyed it and i know there is plenty more in there to use too.

All this is leaving aside moo who had an AWFUL start to the day. I knew we were in trouble when i woke up to find her pressed against me in bed, shuddering into my boobs. I’ve no idea what the problem was but her “vertigo” was terrible; she couldn’t get down the stairs, or really even ask to be carried and i spent until about 11am wrapping her in her little duvet, tucking the edges down tight, squeezing her, rubbing her and putting more heavy duvets on top of her. And then, after an extended period of Fantasia, she suddenly recovered and went off to nursery quite happily.

*Baffled*

Ams has been great today. It occurs to me she is my most rounded child in many ways, vocal, energetic, loves to look at books together or alone, plays imagination games on her own and only seeks comfort if she really has good reason. Given the relationship she and i have had for the last year, she ought to be rocking in a cot somewhere, but maybe all the rejection of me had more to do with a fierce independence and desire to be self-reliant. I don’t know.

*Baffled again*

Ammi’s longest ever sentence

“mummy, milk bottle this way please!!!”

Last night Max remarked that Ammi has to be a good year ahead of where Moo was in terms of speech - actually its probably more like 18 months ahead but its so great for us to be really able to talk dispassionately about Moo and how she has developed now. For a long time it was really only me who was worrying/coping/trying to work things out or at least vocally - it was a difficult subject for us to discuss as parents. But lately, mainly since dx which proves i suppose that i was right to go ahead and get it, he has been really, really clued up and objective about her. Its such a weight off my shoulders. :~)

I’m reading…

George and Sam by Charlotte Moore. This is pretty fascinating on rather a lot of levels for me; first its a description of two very different autistic children, brothers, being narrated by someone who can view them from a level perspective. And secondly because they are the nephews of Fran’s godfather and reading a book about 2 children i have heard about, at times, for 10 years, which has references to brothers i know of, or have met and photos of a granddad i have met, is destinctly odd.

I remember Fran’s godfather telling me about their eldest when he was maybe six, just a random remark about a child who at the time i think they thought had Aspergers rather than full blown autism - and thinking even this small incident of running off or something sounded like an insurmountable, terrible crisis that i could never face.

You have to laugh :~)

Its interesting because Moo is currently going through a good phase that makes me wonder if i am slightly mad but a lot of this book is extremely familiar, even if her boys are far higher up the “spectrum” than Moo is, or i hope, ever will be. Its a cautionary tale though; take nothing for granted.

Its made me realize i need to write down all the things about Moo that led me to seek a diagnosis because they are fading from memory and there might come a time when i have to justify to her why i was so worried.

One thing i do know, and i am defiant enough to say it, is i think i am an exceptionally “good” parent of an autistic spectrum child. I love Moo for who she is - i haven’t shed a tear over the official diagnosis, i don’t want to change her and my total motivation for everything i have done or do is to seek better understanding of her, for her by others and for her by herself.

So there. ;~)

Completely different day!

Lol… well today was a definite change from the last few!

Started off with our MP local group which i took a load of fairly simple crafty stuff to. But it all seemed to go down fairly well and then quite a lot of them came back to ours - and stayed till 3.30pm!!!!!!!

9 kids in a house makes it fairly full but they all had a lovely time and i didn’t hear one fight. Once they had gone my lot were completely busted and its been grizzly and tired since. So everyone is tucked up in bed now.

CGP books arrived which i am cautiously pleased with. We shall see. Not a lot else to say!

Blogging at 4 again!

Scary! (As Ammi would say!)
Well, i mused today, as i cleaned the kitchen and reorganised it so all the sarnie making stuff was in one place, effectively using up a “clutter hotspot” more effectively, that the last 10 days or so i have almost adopted a “structured HE approach”- which effectively shows how pointless labels are, because you don’t get much less structured really. I mean, okay i have used more conventional materials and i have sat people down at stuff, but at no set time, with no pressure to do more than finish the single thing they are sat at and certainly nothing has taken more than a hour of the day, 90 minutes at most. The rest is free. I’ve been trying to remember the figure quoted as actual “effective working time” in primary schools, once you take out lunches, breaks, classroom changes, waiting for teachers and “turns” and so on, i think its less than 2 hours if i remember rightly. Well 90 minutes of decent concentration, in easy bursts with no pressure to do all this no matter what, seems to be working okay. And i must admit, i’m quite enjoying the whole CM aspect, even if its only for a change.

So. Day started again with voluntary wordsearches and Leap Pad music - Moo particularly spent ages on music and was really enjoying “The Magic Flute.” I wanted them to have a slow start as they were up very late last night so they had another burst of Fantasia and were riveted to it again. Bless. They adore the Rhapsody in Blue one, which is line drawings of New York in the 30’s and ties in very nicely with a book “The Gardener” that we have.

Then a serious amount of garden play went on while i tidied (argh! although its been better this week i have to admit!) Fran wanted “something to do” so i gave her a 2x and 10x match up sheet and she did them both all on her own - she used Alisons cards with some of the 2x but it has to have been an emotional crutch as she still had to match those up before she could use the answer, so it didn’t actually give her any more info than the sheet. So thats good. She also worked out 11×10 and 12×10 on her own. Then i gave her a sequence sheet, and she did that too, including finally getting 7’s the right way round! I do find it bizarre that it seems to be easier to get them wrong than right!!! Once Moo was out, and after we had entertained Max, she read Book 10 again and started Book 11 - that bit is definitely getting easier now.

After that i thought she had really done enough “stuff” so i got out our Usborne Bible and read her the Creation Story; its a nicely illustrated book, in bright simple cartoons so i got out the watercolour pads and some oil pastels and we both drew pictures that the story made us think of. I’ve included mine as i tried to really sit and do this with her so we could inspire each other - it was fun. I’m no artist though so i hope you can tell the difference!!



which are, a giraffe and elephant, a palm tree and a bird of paradise
and mine


which are a palm tree and the sea! Ahem.

Then Fran narrated her version of the story back to me and i typed it up for her - its a bit random but its basically there!!!

Creation Story (typed by mummy)
How the World was Made.

The End.

I’ve put it here because i want to be able to print this out at the end of the year again but i have set up a little blog for her to copy this sort of stuff into - no comments though because its probably not at all appropriate!

All that was so lovely that we ended up with the last two Chapters of The Snow Queen - i only just managed not to cry! lol!

Last night Fran impressed me by making it to the second level of RR Maths 6-8 and doing some vertical addition with tens and units - not bad really.

Finish up with some photos.

The Tornado!

Fran’s story drawing the other day.

Taken by Moo - she took some really lovely ones of Ammi but most are a bit bum happy!

Rather a lot to do in the garden.

A very good headstand! (Taken by Moo again!)

The lego house game that kept them up late last night! But bless them, they tidied it all completely away before bed without being asked!

And finally an extremely peculiar Moo moment!!!!

Thinking i might sub our “Flower Fairies Poems” for the treasury ones, since they don’t really inspire me. It would cover a bit of nature study too. I love the Flower poems and we have several collections.

I’ve got a selection of creation stories to print out too which i want to use alongside the Bible Study bit (i’m widening here! lol!) I’ve been doing a few new pages for MP the last few nights which i am going to upload tonight, nothing amazing of my own but some stuff i have had put aside for ages.

Took the plunge and ordered some CGP maths books for after MP camp - not going to attempt any of their other stuff at the moment as i would rather work towards using them as ahem “busy work” in the autumn. She’s not ready for anything that needs reading so we can make them something pleasant later.

Also got a couple of workbook compendiums from The Book People - and if no-one has seen, they have 12 “i wonder why” books for £9.99 - we have the Dino one and its lovely so i have high hopes for the set!

Blogging now ready for another busy evening.

I was quite curious to know what Fran and Moo would make of today after last week and a weekend of not being so “strict mummy-ish” - anyway, by 9am when i was up and about, the girls had turned off the telly and were playing a game together, which i left them to till it ran out of steam.

Then Fran sat down by her own request to do another wordsearch and a writing sheet i had made for her too. I spent quite a bit of this time reading through the first 4 Bob books with Moo; she did the first 3 fine (and i also asked her random words from pages which she could pick out too) and then i read her book 4 and let her do the words she could. That was really lovely and we enjoyed it a lot, curled up on the sofa together.

After she went out Fran and i played the number bonds game again and then to finish off that she did a random sheet of sums making 10, all of which she got right (if you excuse 5’s for 2’s and so on, but she clearly did know, just the odd figure went wrong.) Then we played a similar game with 2x table cards and spent nearly an hour on that, trying to get them so she could recall the answers out of order. She finished that off with the 2x matching game again. All that seems to be going pretty well at the moment, i’m keeping it deliberately easy so she can get lots of “that’s right”s while secretly practising the writing!!! its nice really just to see that her concentration span is expanding a bit.

Finished up with a recap of Bob Book 8 and 10 and then i read her Albion and Brutus from Our Island Story. Enjoyed that, lots of nice fantasy Neptune and mermaid-ing to get the juices flowing after a dry morning!!!!!

So - i think i have achieved penmanship, reading and maths today - plus history/literature and now they are all watching Fantasia 2000 which coupled with a very long stint at the Leap Pad “Hit it Maestro” book this morning probably covers music! That was really funny- Moo was doing a lovely rendition of the Hallelujah (hmmm… not convinced i have spelt that right!) Chorus while Fran managed to fit the words “Hello Lulah!” and “Harry Potter!” to it as well as a rather amusing “mix version” of one part of the 1812!

Also managed to fit in a head on rant at nursery which has been brewing all weekend. Moo was talking school last week, which is fair enough as its bound to come up among her friends, but when the newsletter came home on Thursday it said that they had been using the book “The Hungry Caterpillar” in class to explain to the kids how they were all going to have a big change too and go to big school. Moo had a monumental strop over the weekend about it all - “I want to go to school” “its NOT FAIR” etc but but when i explained to her that if she went to school, and she could, that she would not be able to go to camps, or see friends like Poppy and Matilda etc i got an identical reaction, so clearly she has no idea really what she is asking for. I explained she was going back to nursery and so were some other friends and that all seemed fine but it annoyed me that it was being made so much of. At playgroup of course it was less of an issue because not all the kids were leaving when Fran was staying on. TBH its not that i particularly expect them to accommodate our HEing but Moo is going back THERE, so they ought to be accommodating that.

So i arrived at pick up time and all the staff were sat around and i sat down with them and asked straight out how they were avoiding confusing Moo with all this? And got a load of blank looks, a load of excuses and eventually “I’m sure Maddy understands she is coming back here” - to which i bluntly replied “No, clearly she does NOT” - and i didn’t leave until they had acknowledged that they do in fact have rather a lot of children coming back next year and that those children need as positive a build up as those going on to school. I’m quite proud of myself really because it meant facing up to the staff member (who is one of her keyworkers) who i find a little intimidating. *Pats self on back!*

Avocado has a long root and leaf tips pointing out of the top. Fran calls it a “tornado”!!!

Nothing is ever simple is it?

Bless the boy!

My brother just got a 2:1 in his Geology Masters Degree from Durham - what a boy!!!!!

Amazing Handwriting Worksheet Maker

And this is outrageously clever!!!!

Teaching Time - Teaching Tools

Good worksheets on time here and a nice game or two as well.

Free Worksheets - Primary Worksheets

This has some decent stuff on it - including a generator for “number bond sums” all the way up to 999!

Another easy day.

Both days this weekend Max has been really hands on doing “semi-educational stuff” with the girls - i think sometimes he doesn’t feel its his pitch, so its really been lovely to see and hear it happening. Today he did several dino dot to dots with the girls, made a Nemo matching game for them which Ammi especially loved and most impressive of all did a lovely pictorial treasure trail for them.

Fran did a page of subtraction sums very easily which was great.Then she and i went into town where we completely failed to spend money and ended up with little more than a hairbrush and a pack of oil pastels! Moo and i also had a foray to the garden centre for rabbit stuff.

We finally have a garden, two months later than planned, so the blog has been a non-starter this year, but we perhaps have time for a few flowers and salad. Mark came and strimmed it all and made flower beds with new topsoil.

Baby can now make my tummy move when it kicks!

Will my comments ever come back?

Easy day today.

Its been cold, rainy and nasty here today so we have been mainly indoors but its been okay, with the odd grizzly moment. I had a quick nap in the middle of the day that lasted 3 hours so i think its a good job Max was home! I must have needed it! lol!

Mostly i have been mooching about looking for what i want to do next week and stuff; i’ve set it up as a separate blog so i can meander about and copy bits of info i want to think about without annoying anyone/boring anyone!

Max has done loads with them all today, including Letter Lotto, reading, a walk, general playing, tidying up and so on. As well as that Fran did a wordsearch (she REALLY likes those) read Book 9 of Bob First and spent quite a while on the Reader Rabbit 6-8 maths. She’s enjoying that even more now she realizes she CAN actually do the sums it asks for - so that was a result of this weeks effort. We had a bit of a general fight over room tidiness again today and in the end i made them put as much as they could away in the boxes that were meant for those things, then scooped up all the crud that was lying about and marched off with it! lol! Fran has a nice wooden box for her “Sylv. Families” (i think i better start putting SF for that!) stuff and a board with “grass” under her bed, if she can’t get it neat, she’ll lose it.

Having earned £7 worth of 20ps, today i showed her that she could give it to me while i moved money from my account into hers on the computer. She is saving up for this

from sylvanianfamilies and as its £40 she is going to have to work hard. Still, i actually don’t begrudge her 20p for a decently done bit of work and at the moment she is managing to earn about £1 a day, which probably equates to about 90 minutes of “doing something on her own” - works for me! Moo fortunately is still at the stage where any coin will do, so she is a bit cheaper!

We’ve been and got mattresses for the two single beds today, having put the girls old ones on the bunks (that way when they are finally slightly more reliable at night they can have new ones and not before!) This means there room now has a decent bed for an adult, Ammi is now in a big bed not a camp bed (and extremely excited by that!) and we have a camp bed and a couple of air mattresses spare which is going to really improve entertaining and should make the late pregnancy/early baby months a bit easier too.

Just been up to read Part 5 of The Snow Queen and they have put their room neat before getting into bed… that better! Fran had also put Ammi inot a nappy and jamas which was very sweet of her!

Oh yes - and the baby is currently head down with its feet in the air and today Fran finally got to put her hand on my tummy and be kicked - she is so excited, she has been waiting for that for ages! Funny to think this is the third time she has put up with me being pregnant!

Me and someone else

I’ve looked a long time for this article as the links to it were always broken but i really enjoyed reading it.
PNEU Education

I think, if i may make so bold, it has enough of a similarity in atmosphere to what i wrote about my PNEU school (i actually went to two) to suggest that as schools go, these ones were quite unusual
My own PNEU Education

She seems to be able to remember more than me but perhaps because she went to hers when she was older.

Hmmmm….

Hope this improves…..