I created a page for BM and PM earlier, but i’m blessed if i can now actually find it. If anyone happens upon a page with this as the image, i’d be very pleased to have the link, as somehow Facebook seems very reluctant to show people my my own stuff. Odd site.
This week we have really got back to how things should be and how, with a bit of luck and management, they should be from now on.
One good thing about the week is that our new student has started with us (we seem to be a sort of long running emergency family placement for the college now and this is good as a rule); she seems to be a particularly excellent one and the signs are very positive. She’s BTEC, about to go to uni, very organised and easy to be around and she fitted right in. Also, since she’s done all the settings she needs to and just has to build up hours now, she’ll be staying with us till the summer which is also absolutely ideal.
So on Wednesday she got used to us all and helped with the Charlotte’s Web model. This is something we started last year and we read almost to the end but didn’t manage the last 2 sad chapters (my fault, i knew i’d cry and kept putting it off!) However i bought a Read and Respond book on it the other day, which is reasonably good if not earth shattering, but it did inspire me to try and do some extra work around it. As i was caught on the hop a bit (i only found out we were getting S the day before) i thought a good way to start would be to see what they remembered and do something creative. We got them to think about the characters and which ones were major or minor characters and which fell into animal or human groups and then think about a scene they felt would illustrate the book best. Of course, they chose the barn scene and we had a great time working on it. I think they all surprised themselves with how well they did and during the course of it, they talked a lot about the story and could remember plenty. We are planning on making S’s days ones where we do things around the book for the next few weeks.
(Excuse all this, i need to write an LEA report, so am doing a brain dump!)
Max has worked several mornings this week, which may well be a way forward from now on. It means i can get the girls through normals in a finite amount of time and that has really worked. We’ve had a hugely productive week in terms of maths/reading/writing and everyone seems to have actually enjoyed it a lot too, which is excellent. Thursday morning Amelie worked pretty much exclusively with S, which was the point where i knew she’d definitely be good as she was more than capable of keeping her focused. She’s done a few placements in schools, so i was very gratified to discover that she thought the girls maths was pretty fantastic. She and i kind of stared at each other when we realised how quickly Fran had added something up to 188 (correctly) in her head, given it was a sum with 5 numbers in it. Maybe nothing special exactly, but i love seeing it as i know i couldn’t have done it at 9 - in fact, i am not sure i could do it now, i had to write it out to check her!
So Fran has done the data section in 4A (she really likes data, it’s very sweet), revised long multiplication and i’ve taught her to add factions and change them into ones with a common denominator. She’s also covered simplification again and seems to have a total handle on it too. We’ve worked fairly hard recently on the idea of reversing a sum to find an answer and evaluating what info exists in order to work out what answer is needed. It seems to be paying off because she’s got very quick at spotting what number links two denominators. It makes me so proud to see her so confident at it, when it was all such a massive issue for me.
Maddy has been working through 2B at top speed. She’s leaned her 2,3,4,5 and 10 times table and is getting quicker at using them. She loves the methodical nature of working through a book and is thriving on it. In the later half of the week she tackled the fractions section, ordering them, finding greater and smaller and some addition. Easy stuff for her really but enough to keep her going. To some extent, she still requires the practise of reading the questions (mind you, Fran can read them perfectly but just often doesn’t seem to think it worth doing!) so plodding through is no bad thing. Maddy is struggling with getting easily upset at the moment, lots of little things are proving sobbing and hiding, so stretching her isn’t a particularly good idea.
Amelie is pretty simple to keep going. 1B is nearly finished, she is adding and subtracting up to 50 (probably further, but the book doesn’t do it) faultlessly and has figured out the rudiments of times tables too. She likes using Education City, which we started up again this week and came back very quickly with 5×3 is 15 today; apparently she knew it because 3 lots of 5p is the easiest way to pay Stig 15p. I love seeing maths crossing over like that. Tis good.
In an effort to come up with a slightly more interesting set of reading/writing things this week i came up with this. Fran and Maddy did a spelling test (from the ones i linked to before) and then picked 10 of the words to weave into a story, which they dictated to me, for ease of speed really!) Then i got them to think about finding the 6 most salient points of their story and draw a picture, with a simple line description for each one. They only did 2 pics a day and had to really work on making them their best work - the results have been good and we completed it, which felt great. Friday morning we redid the spelling tests and they both did fine. Amelie did a similar exercise with S, using words from a recognition type book and her story was fab, very inventive!
We’ve also done some “Stories from round the World” and Fran has been reading a history of Britain. Maddy and Amelie read stuff that appeals to them off the shelves; Maddy is so nearly reading for pleasure now, she is certainly fine with some stuff, but she just won’t quite make the leap.
Best bits of the week have probably been the car-ed, talk-ed bits though. The big two and i had an amazing discussion on the way home the other night. It started with the moon, which was one of those huge and orange ones and then Fran said she had heard there were people going to go to the moon again. This led to talking about whether we had ever actually been at all (i’m a non-believer really, i just can’t see how we went in the 1960’s and managed to land, relaunch a rocket, reconnect and get back home when we were still only just getting used to having fridges!). So we talked about conspiracy theories, which led to talking about the politics of why the Americans might have wanted to make people think they had gone, which led to talk of propaganda, to talk of Cuba and Communism, to talk of Iraq and the WMD scandal, to talk of spin and news twisting and thinking about who is telling the news and what they want you to think. We covered everything from WW1 Punch cartoons to thinking about the different audience of Newsround, BBC news her and around the world and news stations from other places in the world with dictatorships. We also talked about societies where you couldn’t get news from outside your own country and touched on the Cold War and Iron Curtain. It was great.
We’ve also had some great dinner talks on history of various sorts. I’ve just finished Anya Seaton’s Green Darkness and am now reading Alison Weir’s Innocent Traitor, which is about Lady Jane Grey. They’ve obviously seen me reading and have been asking, so we’ve discussed Protector reigns, treachery, secret agendas, heresy, religions etc etc.
Max spent yesterday pm with the big 2, working on a measuring project. They’ve come up with a big table of types of measurement, how they are measured and the units and tools for measurement. All seemed very good and they’d obviously enjoyed it. They happened upon a protractor too and so did a bit of geometry and angle stuff.
Good week.
…when i read threads like this about Peterborough Maternity Unit i don’t know whether to be pleased i wasn’t the only one or disgusted that it is still so bad.
My Album is “that is the fact.”
My band is “Erecura”
My album cover is…. here
No idea how to make it show up.
I quite like it. Here, you do it.
Here’s the meme, you design the cover of your band’s album using these links:
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random The first article title on the page is the name of your band.
2. http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3 The last four words of the very last quote is the title of your album.
3. http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/ The third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover. You then take the pic and add your band name and the album title to it, then post your pic.
Thanks Gill 
I think Amelie is possibly the funnies child on the entire planet. I love her rendition of a particular “favourite” Rainbows/Brownies song… “A pizza hut, a pizza hut; jellied fried chicken and a pizza hut!”
Bless the darling girl.
I had my first proper (very productive, it’s amazing what you can do without distractions) day at work. Max worked this morning, i worked this afternoon. This morning i did normals with them all and some creative writing, plus we had a visit from Madison who is now 1 (which means certain other babies must also be 1, Happy Birthday to them too!) This afternoon Max took them out to get measuring project stuff, feed the ducks and various other bits and then they danced. Tomorrow will be different again.
It’s all good. Well, except i don’t seem to be sleeping, but other than that, it’s all good.
The girls are very into HSM2, following daddy indulging them at the weekend (this living on a fluctuating income thing is taking a bit of getting used to!) I have to say, the songs are far more irritating than the original and i’ve got that damned huckamuckadoodah one going round in my head 
So, today, for the first time in 4 years, i didn’t have any stock in the house; i got a text from MF first thing to say “i’m in, i’ve packed a parcel!” which was funny. It was just great to not have anything to distract me at all, we’ve already reorganised deliveries to go to the new place too and i felt more like a home educator than i have in a long time. Oddly enough, much as i have REALLY enjoyed MF’s presence, it was rather nice to have no adult in the house to talk to, it meant i could only concentrate on the girls.
Thought it would be sensible to start with normals and Fran did a WHS test type book (Letts i think) on various things all of which she could do - and then spent some time doing solid shapes and counting edges, faces and vertices. When the concept of one edge only being counted once, not twice, all got too much, i got her to make them with geomags and she was then quite happy with it all. Maddy did S2B on the 5 times table, she’ll be through that book soon and Amelie hugely impressed me by not only completely finishing her Studydog level but also doing a good bit of S1B on adding in the 20’s and 30’s. Effortless really, even without anything to count with.
Maddy did a spelling test and i tested her once she’d practised; she did really well. Then i got her to invent and dictate a story using those words and then break her story into 6 chunks, each of which she is doing a slow and careful illustration of. The first pic was excellent. Fran did similar and her story was very funny!!!! Amelie did some spelling, read a ORT story and Josie did “maffs” with us to (once she woke up at nearly 11am!!!!!!) So we definitely did a very cheerful and co-operative numeracy and literacy morning, which was great.
Then we tidied and ate and Max came home (we are experimenting with working patterns) and then i went off to work (mainly to wrestle with the printer) while Max stayed at home with the kids. They measured the hall, made a happy street track and measured that with flex, timed the train going round it, estimated how quickly it would go down the hall, worked out how quickly it should go down the hall and then did 3 controlled, timed lengths to see how it did. Fran apparently tried out measuring with body parts too!!!! Then they recorded it all and after being initially reticent, they told me all about it at dinner (pasta bake, Fran cooked.) Oh and they went to Jazz.
I enjoyed today SO much , it was great. I really hope the mix is going to work. That said, total retail death today; will be needing some customers!!!!!!!!
Could you remind me to go and read this please?
And if you’d like an insight into living with chronic depression, go and read it too.
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The Cast & Crew
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Fran 9 |
Maddy 8
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Amelie 5
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Josie 3
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