Metaphysical discussion of the week

This afternoon we were watching "Happy Feet" on the TV when Iona started asking "Who made the adverts?". I replied "The people whose products are being advertised". This seemed to satisfy her, but shortly after she continued:
"Who made the TV?"
"People in factories"
"Who made people?"
"God"
"Who made penguins?"
"God"
"Who made God?"
... Gulp!!!
"Um ... nobody did. He's always been there."
"No - God made God!".

A is for ... part 2

As I said earlier, on Thursday we had an Astronaut Day, inspired by the fact that lately Iona has been very keen to go in a rocket. I told her she had to be fit to do that, so at least once a day now she runs around or does other "exercises" and says she's getting fit "so they let me in the rocket!". I didn't do as much preparation as I might have, but she seemed to enjoy the day. I encouraged her to dress in a pair of grey jogging trousers and a blue fleece, to look a little like an astronaut's casual wear. She had a croissant for breakfast, and I reminded her that she wouldn't be able to have that in a rocket, as the crumbs would float around due to the lack of gravity, and might break the rocket. After breakfast I went on the computer and found some NASA and European Space Agency logos, then made Iona some badges (using our printer, a laminator and some safety pins) and an ID badge:

While on the ESA site I let Iona have a look around, and there was a fun animation about a day in the life of an astronaut. We strapped ourselves into our imaginary rocket, ran through the safety checks, then counted down. I asked Iona where she'd like to go, and she chose Mars. When we "landed" I described how it was cold, and that the ground was red, then asked her what she could see. We practised a floaty, low gravity way of walking, and talked a bit more about space. She then said she wanted to go to the planet Crayon, which was what she had called the planet she'd decorated in her Charlie and Lola magazine earlier in the week, so we got back in our "rocket" and took off once more, to go there. Once there, she wanted me to be an alien, so I decided to talk only in alien bleeps and bloops and see if she was able to communicate with me. Surprisingly, with only a bit of sign language, she worked out that I was telling her to eat the imaginary biscuit she had asked me for, and was making significant attempts to understand my alien language. This was such a popular activity that several times yesterday and today I was also asked to be an alien, but I found it surprisingly hard work to keep up the bleeping!

In addition to our play-acting, Iona drew a picture of an astronaut, or "space lady", complete with helmet (and big hair!):

I also found a colouring picture of a female astronaut which I printed out for Iona, but she didn't show any inclination to colour it. I found some information about Yuri Gagarin, Valentina Tereshkova (the first woman in space), Christa McAuliffe (the first teacher in space, well nearly), and Helen Sharman (the first Briton in space) told Iona about them, printed out their photos and added them to her timeline. We read through "I'm Going to Be the Best Astronaut Ever", "Extreme Jobs: Astronauts" (well, selected highlights of it, as it's far too old for her), and Letterland's "Annie Apple's Adventure", which coincidentally includes an astronaut and a trip into space. The latter book was very popular, and she has asked for it to be read a couple of times since. It features lots of "a" words and has a good story line, rather than being driven solely by phonics.

By the end of the day we were both glad to come back down to Earth, although Iona still shows no sign of diminished enthusiasm for being an astronaut!

A is for ...

Well, we've begun our first week proper of the Letter of the Week curriculum. I began by reminding Iona of some words that begin with A, e.g. apple, alligator, astronaut, animal, ambulance and alphabet. For our first Bible reading this week we finished the story of Adam and Eve, and asked her what Adam began with. She immediately replied "a". I then presented her with a worksheet from Christian Preschool Printables which combined a colouring picture of them with writing practice of "Aa" and their names. However, for now it still remains untouched, as she currently seems very keen not to do anything suggested by Mummy!

On Tuesday we attended our local Christian home educators' group, Fun Club. This month we were doing about powered flight, and there were lots of related things to make. However, Iona decided to spend the morning playing with the toy kitchen and food, and later the Lego - once again, perish the thought of doing what Mummy suggested!! In the afternoon she had a really good time playing with the other children, of a variety of ages. The Lego provided me with a good opportunity to reinforce the concepts of sharing and negotiation, as both Iona and some of the boys wanted to play with the same parts. Happily, everyone seemed fairly satisfied, and hopefully Iona has learned valuable lessons about how to play together. We were virtually the last to leave the hall, as Iona was having so much fun running around with a slightly older girl, and having her first game of "Tag". From the Fun Club library I was able to borrow some very useful resources for this week and the rest of the month.

The first resource I used was from the Letterland series: An Alphabet of Rhymes. I read Iona about half the poems from it, and she really enjoyed it, so I'm looking forward to reading her the main Letterland books, 3 of which I got from the resource library. I also read her the A poem from Nonsense ABC Rhymes, which was quite funny. As Iona enjoys poetry and rhymes (she keeps saying she's making one up), this seems quite a good activity for her.

Yesterday I took Iona to the supermarket, so I deemed it "Asda Day". This is a word that Iona has known for a couple of years now, I think, so it was a nice way of reinforcing her knowledge. We found a couple of foods that began with a, although as I was on a tight schedule to catch the only free bus home again we didn't have much time for education while there. When we got home I drew the Asda logo on a cardboard shelf unit that I'd built for her a few days ago, and encouraged her to colour it in, which she mostly did. In the afternoon I had intended to play shopping with Iona, using the till set that she bought last week with her Christmas money, but once again she didn't want to do what Mummy suggested!!!

Today I'd suggested to Iona that we have an "Astronaut Day", especially as lately she's been very keen on the idea of going in a rocket, and that idea appealed to her. I've run out of time now to feed back from that, but hopefully I'll manage a full report, plus photos, tomorrow.

Letter of the Week: Alphabet Intro Week

One of my plans for this year is to help Iona develop her reading, using look-say (which is how I was taught when I was a year older than she is). As "Teach Your Baby to Read" (how I learned) seems a bit too structured for her I thought I might try Brightly Beaming Resources' Letter of the Week Preschool Curriculum. I liked the way this reinforces the letter being learned by introducing lots of different subjects beginning with that letter (e.g. apple, ambulance and Africa for "a"). Hopefully this will give enough variety over each week that she won't rebel and refuse to do anything I ask, like she did with lapbooking by the end of last year! The other thing that I particularly like about it is that it's free!!

In preparation, therefore, this week I decided to work through the Alphabet Intro Week. However, I've found that (possibly owing to my aversion to phonics!) we don't have many A,B,C books (I've just remembered a Dora one in her bedroom, so maybe we'll look at that tomorrow), and owing to the holidays I've not managed to get to the library this week. Consequently, I didn't really manage to start on the curriculum with Iona 'til today, when I decided we would try the activity Fishing for Letters. While Iona played with My First Starting to Read (that Father Christmas had found for her at a fayre last autumn) I cut 26 small fish shapes out of card, stuck a split pin in each (as we had no paperclips, but actually the pin makes a good eye) and wrote a letter on each in small case. I also tied a horseshoe magnet that Iona likes to play with onto a piece of string, and tied the other end onto a large bubble-blowing wand that we've had sitting around for a while. Voila - one magnetic letter fishing set.

Iona was quite interested, and happily came over to play. I fished a couple of letters off the floor and asked Iona what they were; she was easily able to say. She then had a go, although used her left hand to guide the magnet onto the letters. Once she started, she wanted to take all the turns herself, which was fine by me, so all I had to do then was listen to her read the letter. She confuses "p", "b", "d", and "q", and read "z" on its side as "N", but overall she did very well, both with letter names and sounds, and has some idea of what words might start with some letters, e.g. "snake" for "s". As time went on she changed the game to one where she picked up a fish with her hands, brought it to me upside down, and I had to guess what the letter might be. As she was still being exposed to letter names and sounds I went with the changes, and we carried on for maybe 10 minutes.

Tomorrow, if we get time around going to the Salvation Army and eating, I will hopefully read an alphabet book with Iona and play her on You Tube the Alphabet Song, which she loves. She also loves E Eats Everything, by They Might Be Giants, so I might show her that again, as well as trying out Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, of which I've heard great things.

Next week we move on to the curriculum proper, beginning with short "a". The Bible stories are supposed to be Adam and Eve, but I ended up doing them this week, so I might have to think of something else to do if she complains. Other subjects I'll hopefully do something about with her are apples, alligators, astronauts, animals, alphabet, ambulances, acrobats, Africa, addition, amphibians, America, and the Atlantic (I may also remind her about the Arctic, that we talked about when we looked at polar bears in November). I don't plan to be as structured as the curriculum is, with different subjects on different days, but rather try to nudge her to read some interesting books with me and maybe do a bit of colouring or craft (which she's really into). Wish me luck!!!

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"!

Versatile Blogger award

Firstly, a big thank you to Sarah, over at Pyjama School, who sent me this award. I love to read her posts about home educating her little boy, who's a similar age to Iona, and her younger daughter - it's fascinating to compare notes on their development, as well as get ideas from her.

The rules of this award are:

• Thank the person that nominated you with a link back to them.
• Tell everyone seven things about yourself.
• Pass this award on to 15 newly discovered blogs and let them know that they’ve received an award!

7 things about me:

• I studied biochemistry at Oxford University.
• My Mum was 40 when she had me (so I just beat her, as I was 41 when I had Iona).
• I worked with adults with learning disabilities for 17 years before I had my daughter.
• I have played guitar in several church and Salvation Army worship bands, 'though I'm not very good.
• I adore Christmas in all its aspects, so haven't really had time to write this blog over December.
• I'm somewhat manic depressive, although life is massively better since I went onto anti-depressants, and I really recommend them for people who think there might be a genetic component to their problems.
• I met my husband through a Christian dating website!

My 15 award-winners (though they may not be newly-discovered):

1. Mama Jenn
2. Housing a Forest
3. Holy Spirit-led Homeschooling
4. When You Rise
5. Mummy..Mummy..Mum!
6. Home Education at the Chicken Shed
7. Ponder the Path
8. Freely Educate
9. Heart of the Matter
10. An Ordinary Life?
11. Art Projects for Kids
12. The Writing Times of Ossett David
13. John Ager's Home on the Web
14. Unit Studies by Amanda Bennet
15. Confessions of a Homeschooler

Happy New Year to all my readers, and have fun perusing some new blogs.

STOP!

Today Iona and I travelled on a coach-like bus to a neighbouring city for a home ed event. Having settled into our seats Iona looked up at the units above and said "Why is that "stop"?". I looked where she was pointing and found she was showing me the "STOP" button above the seats. She had never sat in a similar bus, with similar buzzers, so she had not recognised it from context or (I think) font. I therefore think it's safe to say, that Iona read her first word independently today - WOOHOO!!!!

Autonomous education begins

We haven't really been doing any formal learning for a couple of weeks now, as Iona seemed to have tired of it and wasn't up for any of my suggestions. Every time I tried to read her a polar bear book from the library (as she had previously agreed to a unit study on them) she point blank refused to let me! However, her autonomous learning has been going quite well. She has very quickly picked up a lot of computer skills, especially after I downloaded a free children's browser for her called Zoodles. She is now quite competent with moving and left-clicking the mouse, and has some knowledge of where the "Return" key is on the keyboard. These are too of her most recent drawings with the simple art application within the browser:

Smiley face, I think

Octopus

The games section links to various children's TV websites with games, which are mostly (but not entirely) American, and Iona was thrilled to discover Dora and Diego available on it. She also very much enjoys playing Counting with Elmo, on the Sesame Street site, which has reinforced her number knowledge, and has discovered a game on the Curious George site where she has to share out bones between 2, then 3, dogs. She still struggles with the idea of the latter, but can share fairly well 4 or even 6 bones between 2. At the moment I am unable to find CBeebies through Zoodles, so I have been allowing Iona to look at that using Internet Explorer. Yesterday she was playing on it, and I agreed to print her a colouring page, explaining as I did so what I was doing. No sooner had I returned to my place on the settee than I found she had managed to call up a different colouring page and was printing that out for herself! At this rate, I think I'll have to keep an eye on my eBay account!!

Unfortunately, a week ago our car failed its MOT quite spectacularly - it would have cost £1000 for the necessary repairs (and the car cost less than that 3 years ago)! Consequently, we are now a carless family, so are having to get used to walking everywhere. Iona is taking the opportunity to fit some more learning in. On Tuesday we had a half hour walk back from the library, and she spotted some moss growing on a wall as we walked. She was fascinated by the look and feel of it, so I explained a bit about it. On the walk there, as well, she asked me what the clouds up in the sky at the time were called (I think her Daddy calls them mackerel clouds), so we looked them up when we got there (altocumulus, as it turned out). Similarly, on today's dog walk in a very nearby park I was able to show her some huge brown toadstools I'd noticed. She asked me what the stripes were, which led to a discussion about their spores.

Evacuation and rationing continues

Yesterday I began by showing Iona a BBC video I had borrowed from our Christian home education group: Children in the Second World War. I found it quite a good introduction to World War 2, but Iona, as ever, wanted to watch her CBeebies programmes instead. However, she became more interested as it played. It explained evacuation, which concept Iona appeared to grasp without worrying that it was going to happen to her (I kept reminding her that this happened a long time ago). It also talked more about rationing, and about air raids and the Blitz. Although Iona seemed to understand that it was all in the past, she didn't like seeing the bombs and burning buildings, so I fast-forwarded through that. I then suggested that we could make a pretend gas mask, using instructions I'd found online (sorry, can't remember where). However, she remained quite adamant that she really didn't want to do it, and I backed off as she seemed to be a bit worried by the idea of bombs.

To complement the learning about rationing I had bought a tin of Spam last week, so I suggested we grill slices of that for our sandwiches, as well as showing her a picture of one in "Food and Rations". Despite saying that she wouldn't like it, Iona found she really did! For a teatime pudding I found a parsnip pudding recipe in "Wartime Cookbook" which, despite sounding a bit weird, was actually a rather nice, chocolately blancmange-type pudding, although it didn't set well until it was cold. I also made a "crumb fudge" from Mum's old wartime recipe cuttings. It's not really like fudge, more like a chocolate refrigerator cake made with breadcrumbs, but Iona and I like it, and it certainly satisfies a chocolate craving.

Today our wartime learning was confined to attending a memorial service at our local park and war memorial, which was held today due to the local British Legion having commitments elsewhere tomorrow. Iona was adamant that she didn't want to wear (or colour in earlier) a poppy, but was interested in the old soldiers and enjoyed hearing the Last Post - she referred to it several times later.

I think our World War 2 project is now nearing its close, as Iona seems to have had enough, but I will try to encourage her to colour one of the poppy colouring pages I have printed out for her first.

India mini-book and rationing begins

Yesterday I went with Iona up to her bedroom to get her dressed, and while we were there she decided she wanted to look at her Disney's "Wonderful World of Knowledge" series that I keep out of her reach in her bedroom. She wanted to look at several of the books, but I tried to relate them all back to what we'd seen the day before about India. One of the volumes she looked at was about famous places, and I managed to find the Taj Mahal in it, so I told her about it and how it was made to show how much the Emperor Shah Jahan loved his wife. We then talked about how we show we love people.

To make a mini-book about India I drew an approximate diamond (about the shape of India) on a sheet of thin card folded into 4, and cut it out. On the cover I wrote India in dotted lines, which Iona was only too happy to write over. Inside I wrote pages about how Grandpa was in India during the 2nd World War, "It is hot", Indian food, saris, their flag and the Taj Mahal, with key words dotted for Iona to write over. She drew and coloured the sun, the Taj Mahal (with a bit of prompting to look at what there was, and not really recognisable), a sari-wearing lady, triangular (or not!) samosas and jalebi (with a suggestion of how to do it by scribbling). In addition, I suggested that she copy the Indian flag from "Celebrate! India". I asked her to draw a rectangle (which wasn't very rectangular!) then asked her to draw 2 lines across it. She started drawing it outside the rectangle, so I drew them. Then I asked her to draw a circle in the middle, which she did. After that I asked her to draw lots of little lines in the circle. I thought she would struggle with this, but she drew a tiny circle in the middle of the circle, and drew several spokes radiating from it, just like in the flag. I was so impressed!

Unfortunately I have had to give this complex, and probably not very good, description as I managed to drop our digital camera on Sunday night and it immediately stopped working, apparently for good. As I have mislaid my mobile phone, with built-in camera, my husband's won't download to a computer without the purchase of an expensive driver, and our scanner mysteriously stopped working a couple of years ago, it looks as if I'm going to have to do this blog photo-free for now!

Having completed our India mini-book yesterday, I moved on to the home front with Iona today, and explained about rationing. I began by pointing out that Britain is an island, surrounded by water. However, she wasn't very interested, preferring to use the blow-up globe for a game of catch! I decided to join in with that but gradually brought in what we previously read in "The World Came to My Place Today" about where our food comes from, and asked her to say where something came from each time she caught the ball. This worked to get her interest a bit, so I went on from that to say how the Germans stopped boats coming to Britain with foods like those we'd named. I looked with Iona through the book "Food and Rations", explaining some of the pictures as we came to them, particularly the posters of Potato Pete and Doctor Carrot, which she liked. I also showed her my Mum's old recipe book, featuring wartime recipes and several cuttings from newspapers of the Ministry of Food's wartime food tips. By now it was nearly lunch time, so I asked Iona to help me make a wartime recipe: cheese pudding (found in "Wartime Cookbook"), which she liked the sound of. She helped to break the eggs, grate the cheese and breadcrumbs, and mix it, and after cooking it we ate it with a small salad. All agreed that it was lovely and cheesy ('though it would have used the family's weekly cheese ration!).

While working and playing this morning, I played the CDs "Hits of the War Years" and "A V.E. Day Party", so that Iona got a feel for wartime music. She wasn't keen, but this was mainly because she wanted to put one of her children's DVDs on instead. I was able to get the CDs through our Central Library, who are selling off all their CDs, DVDs and videos cheap. This was very useful to me in the short-term, but I will be very sorry to see the service go, as it's so useful for projects like this, when I don't necessarily want to keep a particular album, but just want to expose Iona to different music.