Chickafinty ~ A Life in the Laundry

Everything you ever wanted to know about...SPACE

• the planets are Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune Chickabid
• Pluto is a dwarf planet Chickabid
• Mercury is the second hottest planet even though Mercury is closer to the sun than Venus Chickabid
• Venus is hotter because its atmosphere is very thick.  The thick atmosphere makes Venus hotter because it stops the heat escaping Chickabid
• the sun is much bigger than our planet, Earth The Duchess
• Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars are rock planetsChickabid
• Jupiter and Saturn are gas planets Chickabid
• Uranus, Neptune and Pluto are ice planets Chickabid
• all the planets are very far away from each other Chickabid
• Saturn and Uranus and Neptune have ice rings that go around them Chickabid
• there was a man who walked on the moon and his name was Neil Armstrong The Duchess
• the moon is smaller than the earth The Duchess
• the orange fuel tank on the space shuttle wasn't always orange The Duchess
• the first two space shuttles had a white fuel tank The Duchess
• they stopped painting it white because it was less heavy when it was orange The Duchess
• Neptune is closer to Pluto than all the other planets The Duchess
• the Moon is a very cold place at night, and really hot during the day Chickabid
• twelve people have walked on the moon...Chickabid
• there were seven moon missions, but only six of them got to land on the moon's surface Chickabid

more information coming soon along with some videos that we have found and pictures of our lapbooks about Space.

 

 

Knock, knock; Who's there?

They are positioned one on each side of the bathroom door, playing house.  One knocks and the other greets, then the other knocks and one greets and they are having the most marvellous, noisy, giggly, silly voice time.

They are supposed to be emptying the dishwasher.

Progress report

Well.

It's the end of Semester One and the traditional reporting season has arrived.  Our homeschooling experience is 6 months old and it would seem appropriate to look back on the last six months and look at how far we've all come.

DESCHOOLING

At school, everything fits neatly into a box.  We've only got five hours of classroom time a day, so there has to be a definable purpose in everything that we do.  It has to fall under one of the key learning areas, it has to be outcomes based, it has to be assessable, preferably immediately or at least by the end of the week or the end of the unit.  Literacy takes first place and absorbs the first two hours of the day.  Maths takes up another hour and the remaining two hours are divvied up amongst the other four KLAs, or those two hours are devoted to the lastest thought bubble from the Board of Studies...the COGs unit.

Homeschooling is NOT like that.  Homeschooling is more about home than school.  It's about learning through life.  A large percentage of learning doesn't fit neatly into a box and it's really hard to quantify and record. 

The academic part of the day is relatively easy to report on.  We spend the morning doing maths, phonics, spelling, grammar, reading, copywork and writing.  We watch For the Juniors and write reports.  We draw, sing, use the computer, write narrations, cook, garden (or just dig!), and we talk.  We talk lots.  I answer questions all day long.  Easy questions like how do you draw a map of Tasmania freehand, to difficult questions like how does the space shuttle get into space...questions that stretch my (considerable) general knowledge to its fullest extent...questions that require a "I don't know.  Lets' find out!" answer.  A lot - and a mean a LOT - of learning is incidental and culmulative.  It's jolly difficult to record this kind of learning.  At school we're constrained by timetables, by delivering curricula to a large number of children with hugely differing abilities.

Where homeschooling is concerned, deschooling has been my biggest difficulty.

(more coming)

That's four from four

We're in the midst of the "Loose Tooth" phase at Chez Chickafinty, with the Ladybaby losing the first of her baby teeth.

We uphold the tradition of the Tooth Fairy, and in the case of Chickabid every precious little tooth went under the pillow ready for her visit.  At least one tooth made it into the box of precious things that a certain Mama Bear keeps ;)

Ladybaby couldn't wait to join her brother in finding coins under the pillow, but with said Ladybaby we've hit a bit of a snag.

Tooth #1 came out at school and was lost in the playground.  Cue explanatory letter to Tooth Fairy.

Tooth #2 came out at a birthday party and was inadvertently swallowed.  Cue second explanatory letter to Tooth Fairy.

Tooth #3 came out in the backyard and was lost in the grass.  Third letter to Tooth Fairy duly penned.

Then yesterday the fourth tooth became wobbly.  Very wobbly.  By bedtime it was hanging by a thread, but too much of a thread to pull out.

Surely, we thought, surely we have to strike luck with this one.

Nope.

She wakes up this morning with the most adorable double gap in the front row at the top and a matching lisp and no tooth.  It's not in the bedclothes or pillow cases or on the floor, it's just vanished.  Again.

So tonight, letter number four to a very patient Tooth Fairy explaining that the tooth is lost.

That's four from four, Precious Princess.

That child!

Coming home from OT yesterday afternoon and apropos of nothing the Duchess announces:

"I really need another Polly Pocket."

The reason?  She's only got one.

Homeschooling Application

I thought that some of you might be interested in seeing our application for homeschooling.  I have saved it in pdf so it should be visible.  If the link doesn't work, please let me know.

Application for Registration Home Education Unit 2009(342.7K)

Our artworks

We worked on some art together for the first time in a "teaching" context and I think they did a pretty good job.  It's a work called Lollipops and Smarties from a book called Introducing Visual Arts for Teachers.  It's obviously not going to hang in any of the Metropolitan Art Galleries, but our fridge will do nicely as a substitute.  We created them using Micador Oil pastels and a purple wash for the wax resist.

Interesting results

I've been using the test materials from the curriculum I plan to use with the kids.  Part of the goal in starting HS over the holidays has been to find out if it works before we jump in feet first and the other goal has been to level the kids and work out where we need to start.

I've already commented on Ladybaby and the gaps in her knowledge.  Chickabid also has gaps and some pretty impressive ones.  He rocked through the first spelling task with no real difficulty except when we came to synonyms, antonyms and homonyms.  He had no problems at all with the first reading task and had it finished and all correct in a matter of minutes.

Enter the second spelling task and the second reading task and BANG!  That was the sound of him hitting a brick wall. 4/35 spelling words correct.  4/18 questions correct in the reading task.  Chickabid can read really well.  He doesn't understand what he's reading.  In the vernacular that's known as "barking at print".  When supported and guided he was able to identify the necessary information, but at the end of Year 2 he should be able to do that without guidance and assistance.  In less than 6 months he'll be doing the Basic Skills Test or whatever it's called now and the whole test has to be completed independently.

Chickabid is going to have to backtrack quite some way at the start of next year.  He's not ready for Year 3 in terms of his spelling, reading or writing.  If we were to leave him in the school system he'd go up to Year 3 anyway and by the end of the year he'd be drowning.  We are homeschooling so we'll be able to backtrack with no real problem.  He'll spend a month or so working through year one work followed by year 2 and then we'll consider year 3.  Mathematically speaking he seems to be fine and hasn't got stuck yet in the test book.  The challenge for me is going to come with the new subtraction variously called decomposition or regrouping.  It took 13 years of school for me to get borrow and payback under control only to learn when studying at Uni that they changed how subtraction is done.  I'm going to teach Chickabid borrow and payback - he's mathematically wired so he'll come up with his own stratgies for working out maths problems.

I've bought a day book and as we work out which level the kids are going to be on I'll start ordering their work books.  I am so looking forward to this!

Trial period

I've started trialling homeschooling with our two, just to see how it goes and is it going to work.

The short answer is yes.

I am coming down with something nasty, Ladybaby has a nasty cough that she just can't shake and Chickabid's class are doing swim school so he's only getting 3 hours of "face to face" every day anyway, so they're home already for the holidays and we're doing school at home.

We've decided to use materials from Homeschooling Supplies as they offer complete curriculum materials, graded appropriately, based on the Australian system, not the American.  Should we choose to homeschool to Year 10 they also offer a Year 10 Certificate (Homeschooling) which is recognised by TAFE for entry into their courses.  The way that tertiary education is going we're thinking that TAFE is going to be a better option than university...they'll be qualified for a job after 1-2 years, but won't have the massive fee-debt that uni students accumulate. 

Homeschooling Supplies also have test books to use to place your child before you begin homeschooling and it is these materials that we're using right now.  Ladybaby is working through Test Your Maths K-1 and Test Your Reading and Phonics K-3.  Chickabid is working with Test Your Maths 2 and Test Your Spelling and English 2.  I have to buy a copy of the reading and phonics book for him too.  As far as I am concerned and speaking with my teacher hat on, these books are terrific.  In a matter of hours I was able to pinpoint gaps and areas of weakness with both of them and have a starting point for planning.  I was stunned at what Ladybaby already knows after just 9 months in Kindergarten.  What I was surprised to discover is that whilst she knows all her single sounds and has pretty reasonable phonemic awareness, her actual "sounding out" skills are very poor.  Not too bad when it comes to CVC (i.e. B -O- B, N- A- N) but CVCC or CCVCC (ie. G- E- T- S, S- N- I- P- S) they are very, very poor.  Phonics skills = great, reading skills = not so good.  We can work on that though.  Chickabid hasn't a clue about antonyms, homonyms or synonyms which surprised me big time and despite having been doing spelling for over two years, he has no clue about spelling rules.

Here's an outline of how our "homeschooling" day is going at the moment:

We start at 8.30.  We finish most everything before lunch.  After lunch activities will include craft, cooking, visiting the library, HSIE and Science activities.

• showers, dressing, breakfast
• make beds, tidy bedrooms, collect up washing, start load (both children will learn how to operate the washing machine...Chickabid can already do it!)
• school work; Ladybaby - maths, Chickabid - language, Mummy - dishes while I supervise
• schoolwork; Ladybaby - language, Chickabid - maths, Mummy - ironing while I supervise
• morning tea and read aloud (we're reading Fantastic Mister Fox by Roald Dahl)
• washing on the line/kids play outside like it's recess time excpet on the trampoline, with tennis balls, Chickabid's basket ball or simply just running about and shouting.  A lot.

• school work; Ladybaby - reading, Chickabid - spelling

• cooking - today it's anzac biscuits, yesterday it was a chocolate swirl cake

• art Introducing Visual Arts for Teachers.  As of yesterday we are the proud owners of our own oil pastels...the same ones they use at school...and a lovely big block of cartridge paper all ready for beautiful crayon and paint art works

• lunch

• birthday present buying for this afternoon

• Chickabid has a birthday party and while he's there, Ladybaby and I are hitting Lincraft for some simple sewing patterns and fabric.  I'm going to dust off the old sewing machine and have a go at making some play clothes for Her Ladyship.  Haven't sewn in over 20 years so that could be interesting.

So, what do you think??  How does our "school day" sound to you?

Layouts, Pyjama Days and Holidays

LAYOUTS

Have been working on a number of scrapbook layouts this past weekend.  Finished the Princess one for Ladybaby, made a PIRATE layout for a challenge at LSBS, started and finished Spatter Painting and am now working on Cubby House.  That's just about more layouts in one weekend than I have done all year.  Cubby House was inspired by a Becky Higgins sketch from her first book, but as so often happens, the results didnd't match up with what I had in my mind.  I played with it for about an hour last night cursing the fact that I've run out of Un-Du and in the end Mister Bear suggested that I simply walk away.

Now that I look at it again this morning I realise that it looks ok.  Pretty good actually.  A couple of fifteen minute slots today should see it finished and then I can move onto the next project.

HOLIDAYS

The kids start holidays on Monday, but I am seriously considering giving them an extra few days.  Ladybaby has a teasy cough, Chickabid has a nasty cut under his eye and a teasy cough and I am definitiely cooking something unpleasant.  My voice began to give out yesterday and as I don't have a sore throat this can't be good.  Today has already been declared a "pyjama day" and although we're not actually going to wear pyjamas, we're going to have a quiet day together. 

If we're being honest we're getting more and more disenchanted with the school system.  Chickabid came home a few weeks ago talking about the book they were reading in Crunch, Sip and Read time and whilst it was nothing truly objectionable, it wasn't a book that we would have chosen for our children.  Something that Mister Bear and I have realised over the last few years is that with kids it's very much a case of GIGO - Garbage In, Garbage Out.  Fill their minds with computer games, electronic media and garbage and garbage is pretty much all you'll get.  We want more than that for our kids.  We want to know what they're being taught.  We want to know what values are being instilled in the kids.  It's part (but not all) of the reason we've decided to homeschool.