Iona the Explorer

  As we are now up to the letter E in our Letter of the Week (more like Letter of the Fortnight, due to other activities taking up time!) I suggested yesterday to Iona that we pretend to be explorers today. She liked the idea, so when we got up I reminded her of different places people had explored (desert, jungle, arctic/antarctic, ocean, space) and asked where she wanted to pretend to go. She chose the jungle, then said she wanted to go to the real woods with me. As we were due to go to craft group at church in the morning, which is on the way to the woods, I agreed we could, then asked how we would go on our adventure. Iona was feeling a bit literal and insisted we would walk. I tried to stay in character and tell her that the jungle was a bit far to walk to, and eventually she joined in and agreed to go by plane. I told her about her uncles' jungle adventure in Malaysia for a couple of weeks in the 1970's, but I don't think she really took me seriously about that (I don't blame her - even I find it hard now to believe they actually did it!). I also looked through World History and Explorers with her over breakfast and later in the day and we learned a little about Columbus, Magellan, Drake, Da Gama and others. We had borrowed the colouring book Women Explorers from Fun Club on Tuesday, so I copied some pages from that, although she didn't colour any in. She also never got around to colouring this Columbus printable from The Holiday Zone, although I am keeping all the printables in her Letter of the Week folder, so if she changes her mind at some point she will still be able to do them.

When it was time for Iona to get dressed she herself chose to wear her khaki and olive pinafore dress, as she said that "Andy in Andy's Wild Adventures wears green". We discussed other clothes to wear, and agreed that she needed thick trousers to protect her legs, a hat to protect her head from the sun, a waterproof coat, strong boots, and thick gloves "to protect my hands from snakes"! We also packed her explorer's rucksack with a telescope and binoculars, although we couldn't find her camera, so we agreed that Mummy's would have to do.

At craft group Iona has begun to work on her own scrapbook while I do my own crafts, so for today's activity I decided to follow an activity which I found on The Holiday Zone's Columbus Day activities. We talked about the furthest she'd ever been, which was our holiday last year. With a bit of prompting she remembered this was Dorset, and I found our holiday photos and invited her to choose some to print out for her scrapbook. She enjoyed doing this, and at craft I cut them out for her and she stuck several into her book, decorating the pages with stickers. This provided a good way to reinforce the idea of herself as explorer.

After 45 minutes at craft we left (Iona was in a bit of a "silly" mood today and as most of the attendees are older ladies I didn't want us to outstay our welcome!). Iona heard some other children going to the park and said she wanted to go there, so we made that our jungle:

The intrepid explorer spies out the land

Now for a spot of mountain climbing

 When we had been there for about 45 minutes I said it was time to go, but Iona was still keen to go into the wood. She said she was not too tired, so I agreed to go home the very long way (about another 45 minutes), through part of the wood. Again, she tended to be very literal about what we were seeing (e.g. a dog), but began to get more into it, so that when a van came past just after we crossed a small road she told me that there was a crocodile in the river!

When we finally reached home Iona seemed quite tired, but managed to eat a little lunch. Afterwards she curled up on the settee next to me watching TV (2 programmes I found on Madagascar and the jungle) while I showed her how to magnetise a needle and make it into a compass, as in The Science Activity Book. It wasn't easy to magnetise it, and took a lot more strokes with the magnet than the 50 recommended in the book, but it worked slightly in the end, pointing vaguely north when floated in water, and was a good way to introduce the idea of compasses. Iona, however, was more interested in a spot of water play, and proceeded to fill the bowl with as many of her craft supplies as she could!

Back at home she makes a compass

Close-up of the home-made compass

 To close the Explorers' Day we looked at Iona's children's atlas and I showed and told her all the places her Dragon ancestors had explored: from France to Reunion Isle to Southampton to London to Swanage to Bristol then Woking and finally to where we live today, each generation since 1818 being born in a different place.

Seeking Baby Jesus: a Lesson Learned

Over Christmas I've discussed the Christmas story a lot with Iona. She played an angel (or, as she was determined to view it, a fairy!) in our church Nativity, and we also used Truth in the Tinsel as our advent Bible study. It certainly seems to have sunk in: this morning we were both upstairs when she came rushing in to my bedroom saying "Come quickly to Bethlehem. There's a baby there!". She was holding a small, round, glittery scrunchie above her head, and told me "This is a halo". When I said "Are you an angel, then?" she replied "Yes", and led me in to "Bethlehem"!

Happy New Year

Well, it's a new year, and I'm back. For those who don't know, I've had heart valve replacement surgery 4 weeks ago, so education has had to take rather a back seat, both now and in the weeks leading up to it. However, I did use the chance to teach Iona something about the heart and about jobs of people in hospitals. I'd planned to do it as a lapbook, but that never quite happened. She was very keen on the hospitals books, though, and also the book which I used to introduce the idea of Mummy as a little girl (as I was explaining to her that I had my first heart surgery then) - "Before I Was Your Mother" (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Before-I-Was-Your-Mother/dp/0152058427/ref=wl_it_dp_o?ie=UTF8&coliid=I3AS4HUZ1CTVE7&colid=11ACYI4B09FFG). I was disappointed, though, that it was almost impossible to find any books about a parent going into hospital for an operation, as I could have done with that to help prepare her. The only one I could find was from America, "Let's Talk About When Someone You Love is in Hospital" (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lets-about-Someone-Hospital-Library/dp/0823950379), which wasn't specific to a parent, and didn't talk at all about after-effects, but which was some help.

Unfortunately, due to my operation, I wasn't able to do much work with Iona on the meaning or customs of Christmas, as even when I got home the breathing tube had bruised my voice box so I couldn't talk much. However, I did find this printable nativity set to make - http://mama-jenn.blogspot.com/2009/12/printable-nativity-sets.html. We made the characters on half toilet roll tubes, and managed to make a stable from a cereal box. The original idea had been to assemble it in the window and leave it there, but that was reckoning without Iona! She adored playing with the characters, and did so for days. One day she placed both the angel and shepherd in the stable and I heard her saying "Hello, angel, what are you doing today?" "I'm in the stable"! We don't now have a usable stable scene, but I feel it's worth it, as she knows all the characters and their role in the nativity story well.

Now we have entered a new year, and I have made some new goals for me to achieve with Iona during the year. Firstly, I plan to have her toilet trained, which I will be able to begin working towards as soon as I am able to lift again, after the wound has completely healed. Second, I intend for her to start attending the youngest group of Sunday School on her own some time around her 3rd birthday. I started taking her into it a few months ago, but as the minimum age is supposed to be 3 I have been staying with her to ensure that she doesn't cause problems for the teachers. She enjoys the craft in it, and has been learning some of the names from the lessons, although she still misses being able to play with the toys in creche.

When I can drive again (probably February) I will be able to re-start attending home education groups with her, but I also intend to start going to some new groups. Our local home education group runs a weekly gym session for children from the age of about 3, so I will try her out at that around then. She is also very keen on ballet, so I plan to try a local class that takes children at a similar age and allows you to pay by the week.

At church we have several native speakers of other languages which I don't speak myself. I want Iona to become proficient in a variety of languages, so I'm planning to ask them to help her learn at least basic greetings in them and see what happens from there, to complement my teaching her Spanish and French. If she can just chat to them in their own languages whenever they meet, I think she'll be part-way to becoming fluent, in a way that I never have been in anything other than English.

When I was 4 my Mum started teaching me to read using Glen Doman's "Teach Your Baby to Read" Kit (the nearest I can find now is http://www.gentlerevolution.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=G&Product_Code=0402&Category_Code=K2). I tried this with Iona when she was still a baby, but it didn't really work out, as she wasn't really interested. I thought maybe now would be a better time, so I asked her today if she would like to learn to read this year. She said yes, so I wrote the word "Mummy" in red on an A4 piece of paper and told her what it said, as per the programme. However, she became more interested in the fact of the writing, and wanted to write on it, too, so I'll just try again tomorrow. My hope is that by the end of the year she will have completed the programme and be a competent basic reader. However, she may have other ideas, so I'll just have to accept it if this doesn't happen!

Iona really enjoys craft these days, but still can be obstinate about doing it her way, so I wasn't able to let her help make any Christmas cards this year. I also ran out of time due to my operation. Next Christmas I hope to be able to make all our own cards, and involve Iona, so I plan to start this with her in October to give us enough time.

Lastly, to ensure that I get into good habits with Iona's education before the local authority wants to get involved, I plan to do at least one educational activity (or something that can be considered educational somehow) with her per day. I also intend to contribute to this blog at least once a week, to keep a permanent record of her progress.