Jolly Phonics and Math u see

Well I've brought Jolly Phonics and we are enjoying it. Our daughter was trying so hard to make scene of letters and sound that I really thought it would be a good idea to get some sort of system.

Its hard to keep up with her some times she really wants to race through it all so fast. "Inky and Snake work...come on Mum"

Now I'm trying to find the equal to Jolly Phonics...is it Math u see? Not sure it does not look as fun as in Jolly phonics....we might just have to see.

Science activity

Our daughter is really getting into her questions.

First we did an activity called "Balloon Heads" which you fill up a balloon with flour and add a little water then tie up and squish.

She did this well...then wanted to mix flour then water then flour then water to see what would happen...all done with her hands...then tip it out on the bench and smear it round....write her name in it and stamp patterns. Her brother didn't really want any part of them messy side but love the balloon balls.

Next today was Erosion Activity (oh goodness sand inside as its wet and cold outside). So our daughter sorted it all out in her head. Fill up a cube box with sand so she can make a mini landscape then pour water over it.

Both kids played really well together my son (left her alone long enough to complete her activity).

"Wow it all changed (shape)" "and the water has gone (soaked) into the sand"

Now we've moved onto playing the Ukulele strumming along with Jack Johnson ;-)

Oh goodness....we've done so much...and wow its sounding pretty cool for a first time 5 year old.

Documentary Hungry

Our daughter has loved the BBC walking with Dinosaurs to the point we've had it every morning over breakfast for about 3 weeks.

We do not have TV. So how do we keep a ready supply of good viewing? I've been hunting...and Dave found a few good sites.

http://freeonlinedocumentary.com/

http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/

We watched one of the nature ones yesterday on the four winged Dinosaur...keeping with in the theme ;-)

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/

This was the first documentary site we visited a few years ago...Dave and I watched a program about Bee hive collapse...Think I see a new Unit Study coming up.

Unschooling the swimming lessons

Both my children have had swimming lessons. My daughter has had a few terms now my son only one.

My son had a really bad experience with his lessons with the whole putting the head under part...all the rest was fine. On his last lesson he was really put off as the teacher took him from me, trying to be fun and light...zoom zoom and under the water and pop up in front of Mummy...tears shaking and very very upset.

I asked him if he want to do the next seasons lessons once he'd had a few weeks off and it was a very loud "NO".

So my daughter had lessons on her own. She did really well...until the last lesson where she was accidentally knocked in the pool by her friend and she was quite hurt. We didn't make a fuss...it was an accident.

But she didn't want to go back to lessons.

I let her cool over the term holidays. I said that I would be booking her next lot of swimming lessons...and was told. "No Mum, its too cold to swim in winter".

So that was the end of lessons.

But not the end of learning and not the end of swimming.

We do not go to the pools on cold days cause it really is just too cold and the kids go blue...but we go once a week if we can.

Their swimming has come along in leaps and bounds. My daughter is pushing herself constantly. I've had to buy 'treasure' which I throw out into the pool and she swims and dives for it. Loving every minute.

My son who was really scared of putting his head under the water is now letting go of me walking around the baby pool and slowly dunking his own head under the water...and coming up smiling.

Painting group

Our painting group is going along really well.
I asked our group to paint a colour wheel. This was something I did on one of my first lessons in collage...took our class a whole hour back then...and it took the kids today about 25mins.

Some of them didn't get it at first putting the primary colours out first then mixing the colours and putting them in the gaps...but hey nothing learnt if a few mistakes are not made.

Our groups numbers are growing but we always seem to have a few missing due to holidays or ill health.

One of the many reasons why we are learning from home is that our daughter does not do so well at the moment with large crowds of people...and I've just working out her limit...about 7-8 people. Sadly today she was very over whelmed and wanted to spend most of her time hiding in her room or going out to see her chickens.

I kept the children working so the noise level was low and I had back ground music playing today which seemed to help a great deal too...but as soon as the noise went up our daughter wanted to rush off.

Painting is coming along really well. Experimenting with colours has been great. Learning the different ways to make them has been really exciting for some. Green seems to be the favorite one at the moment.

I find it amazing how much children remember. I warned them that the use of black when mixed into another colour can be very over powering my words were "you can really kill a colour with too much black"...my choice of words. They were parroted back this week when the black was dished out.

Well we'll see how we go next week... I think it might be the last week that we're running it but I'm sure I'll dream up of something new.

Solar System painting

Our daughter is going through a phase of painting her hands...then splatting the paper with the paint from her hands.

I've decided to work this into something.

Giving her only colours which are the planet colours I then started to cut out some planet shapes. At first this was not a great exercise then she really got into it.

We've done about 7 planets so far and the sun this morning.

"I want to make some rocks" I questioned her about what she meant...oh meteors...she's been watching BBC walking with Dinosaurs and the movie Dinosaurs too.

"I want to make a space ship"

Goodness a lot to do...just taking it slow though

Finger maths

I've just been wondering if there was a maths out there like Jolly Phonics? and I came across finger maths.

I've tried it and it does work...but is it more difficult to remember this rather than just use your memory.

I don't know my times tables...so is this a way?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZs1MFhF9i8&feature=related

Up date

I take that back....WOW

I lay there at night playing round with this. Once I understood it amazing!!