6 WEEKS IN...

Due to computer issues I've not been on to blog (or anything else) much lately, but having spent the last couple of days building a new PC ~ yes, I built my own, with a bit of messenger help from a friend here and there ~ I can hopefully get back into a bit of a routine with my online-life. But I must say, it's been nice to take a break and focus on other things for a bit :D

So, I promised an update on how our new more-flexible system is working and on the whole, I'm pleased to say, it's working very well for MOST of the children. For Stitch however, the person who I thought this would work better for, it is not working SO well as I'd hoped. This might be more because he is basically 8 and rather work-shy. It doesn't matter what I ask him to do ~ learning activities, or simply picking up his mess ~ he walks around in a dream-world: he begins things, stops, doesn't go back, gets into trouble (and doesn't really care that he has) and is generally quite difficult to motivate to do ANYTHING constructive with his days! He is a mud-up-your-fingernails kid and I need to find a way to be a Mum who is more happy-with-that than I currently am. I still am not managing to be very hands-off tbh and trusting the process doesn't come easily to me :-( That said, he makes it all that much harder for both of us by not showing me any willingness to do anything other than play (and distract others). When he does do some work, he tries to do too much at once and gets in a tizzy. He doesn't seem to register his own limits, or want to listen when I try to help him. So, instead of doing some maths (for example) for about 10 or 20 minutes, and then taking a break and doing something else for a bit before going back to it, he tries to cram for a whole hour and wonders why he hates working so much - he has fried his brain! Then, because the last experience wasn't great, he avoids doing anything at all and ends up with hours and hours of work left to do at the end of the week, having used up all his 'free learning' time in one or two swoops, or spent the whole day playing!  I don't know if I'm doing the right thing by leaving him to learn the hard way, meaning he misses out on free time with his siblings in the evenings and on weekends (because he has work to catch up), or whether I would be better to come down a bit harder on him so that he has more free time. He, by the way, doesn't see that all the playing he does in what he considers 'school time' counts towards his free time. My children are very stuck in a 9-4 routine and it's proving very hard to get any of them to break that mindset. Stitch, however isn't so much in the routine as his mind likes to think he is!! We're only 6 weeks in though, so I'm hoping things will improve. For the others though, the new way has proved very successful. It enables to my early risers to get up and get on, and my late risers to take it at their own pace. DD, for example is a 'plougher' - this week he has worked really diligently and completed everything he 'must' do by Thursday late morning, leaving himself free to get his chores out of the way and carry on building his den in the garden all afternoon and all day tomorrow if he chooses! We've also done some baking this afternoon, so that was 'extra' that he chose to join in with. Stitch on the other hand, just by comparison, still has about 3 hours worth of empty spaces on his chart, so will end up with a day of work and chores tomorrow (and maybe Saturday), but instead of doing some of it, he is currently in the garden den-building with his brother. It's not that I don't count the den-building as educational - I know it is - and I would be fine with it, IF every now and then he just came in and did a few minutes 'work', to chip away at the back-log he has left himself. I wouldn't mind either if he didn't care about working in the evenings, but I know that I will have a tantrum on my hands if I ask him to do anything after 4pm. I'd be happy with him working in the evenings ~ after-all that is definitely when I work best and it might well be for him too, but HE is not happy with that arrangement, because it means he doesn't get 'screen time' (screens aren't on in the day time, other than for educational purposes, as they are too distracting to EVERYone), or to 'play' (lol). I've been out and reminded him of the time and his need to do some work, but he just 'nnnyah'-ed at me and carried on, so I'll be facing upset later then! This really is a catch 22 ~ fuss now or fuss later... let him choose to make bad choices & face his own consequence, or coerce him into doing things my way and face the long-term consequence of a child who is possibly less able to make good choices on their own. Right now I'm fighting the urge to coerce him and letting him be because I THINK that is the right thing to do, but I'm also dreading the melt-down that will be inevitable later. 'Training' children is no easy task, when you have one that doesn't want to listen to any form of reason - and doesn't easily learn lessons from the consequences (good or bad) of his actions. 

As part of my 'make it better' this year, I've have decided that we need to go out more. I don't drive, so this can prove challenging, but Paul's hours at work have changed a little and he now has two days a week working for the church. This is great for us too, because it means on a Tuesday he is free to drop us at the train station in the morning (saving us a phenomena amount of bus fares) and we can off out for the day and be back in time for tea :D. So last week I renewed my family railcard, courtesy of Tesco vouchers, and we took advantage of the tail-end of the Indian summer and headed for Colwyn Bay. Just an hour on the train and we spent the best part of the day on the beach! The kids loved it and the day was not too long. The clouds came over and it began to rain just as it was time for us to get the train home :D. I think we will go to Liverpool next month. It's a year since we were last there, and we never got out of the Science Museum that day!! This time we won't go there, but instead will head down to the docks, where The Tate and the slave museum are ~ or we might spend some time looking at the amazing Architecture! Liverpool is definitely a city we need to make several trips to, to get the best from it. 

This weekend my eldest children are all away... four are going to The Gathering and their levels of excitement are rising as I speak. This is one of the highlights of their year. Lots of meeting up with friends, and LOUD worship with about 2000 other young people from around the country. Worship to D&B music may not be for everyone, but they love it!! Joel decided not to go thought this year, so he is going to a different worship conference in Bradford with another friend. 

I'll leave you with some of the highlights of the last few weeks in photos (and video).

Beach Day...

Male or female?

The English trench!

The German trench.

The bombing!

Other fun that's happened...

SCIENCE

This is possible Phoebe's favourite subject this year. She's loving being left to do her own thing with this and work at a her own pace.

There's a stop motion that we made to go with this too, but I've not uploaded it yet.

ART
Stitch & DD's

Chip's

Chip's first 'proper' people drawings :D

MATHS 

(with spontaneous art and literacy built in)

SPIELGABEN

WRITING

NATURE WATCHING

COOKERY
The girls and DD made shortbread...

whilst Stitch and chip made simple biscuits.

And today we made these!


...which were seriously INCREDIBLE ~ so incredible they left Chip speechless - and he is SO fussy about his goodies!

Planning for FrogAcademy 2015

This year sees the dawn of a year when I have my eldest son, who has completely finished his education and is job-hunting, whilst at the same time my youngest just begins the journey of his 'education' years. If I am being totally honest here, I'm 13 years in, with another 12 years looming ahead of me, and the thought is very daunting! I cannot even begin to drum up the mad-enthusiasm I had in those beginning years. In those early days (after we walked away from ACE) I would spend hours downloading - on significantly slower internet, printing and planning. And then I would try to muster up the same enthusiasm in my children ~ and often it fell flat, but I persisted anyway. Gradually, over the years, I began to hear my children better and started to model their education around them more as individuals, and life improved. If you read back over the years of my blog though, you will observe that we began very structured and timetabled; loosened up somewhat, but still had very much a formal style of learning. Up until now that has worked for almost all my children. I don't think it ever fitted Jake that well, but I was unable to make the shift in my head (or heart) back then and ultimately he has done very well, finishing college with Btec Level 3 Photography with great grades (D*DD), plus a GCSE in both English and Maths. For Joel, the girls and DD the scheduled approach has worked fine. Even Lilo, who might have struggled most, has been OK with the way things have been. Even if the content has been a stretch at times - and not that enjoyable for her, the structure hasn't bothered her. But then Stitch came along, and after him Chip. Stitch began home-ed with gusto and enthusiasm, but that has quite rapidly worn off because, as more has been 'required' of him, he has increasingly switched off to the idea of table-work. He is definitely not a child to sit still and learn to a timetable and the way we have done things has been a bad fit for him this last year - leading to tension in him and stress in me - giving me a sense of deja-vue that took me back to Jacob's early days, and I have no desire to go hang around there again! Adding Chip into the mix this year, and I am thinking it's going to be a nightmare to carry on doing things with the same structure this academic year. 

After a bit of a think I have come up with this:-

This is DD's sheet, but they each have one with slightly different headings - except Abbie, who has chosen to write her own timetable (without times). Phoebe is also unsure how she'll get on with this system, but she's giving it a trial run for a month and then she'll decide. In reality, it's a trial run for all of us, but I think it'll work so long as all the children are honest ;-)

The idea is that they are each entirely in control of what learning they do, how much time they spend and when they do it. It's centred around 10 minute slots and the only requirement is that there is SOMETHING written in every coloured box by Saturday bedtime. Although there is still a requirement for them to do a certain amount of learning each week I am chilling out about what that learning looks like. Math could be done in a workbook, on Conquer Maths, on a app, or on a learning website (e.g. Skoolbo, or Sumdog). They do however much they choose to do and record how much they did, and what they did by writing in the boxes. If they did 20 minutes of Skoolbo they'd just write Skoolbo in the 10 min box and a ditto in the 20 min box. 

General Interest will be filled in with things we do in groups together ~ like cookery and art. 

'English' I have split up a bit, so they can record what kind of learning they have done. This is because some of the workbooks they have contain various types of tasks and it's often difficult for me to make sure they are getting a balance. This way I will be able to see at a glance where any gaps are forming and address them ~ although not necessarily with workbooks ;-). I am also hoping to do a lot more literature based work with the younger ones this year ~ bouncing off the back of poetry and prose. We begun using FIAR a little last year, and it was enjoyed by all three younger boys, so I am hoping to inject more of that into our learning this year.

Also, I am hoping to make plenty of use of our Spielgaben set ~ especially with the youngest two boys.

All this could add up to very busy days for me - jumping from one activity to another as and when the children need my attention. I know am not too great at that in reality, which is how we ended up with a structure in the first place I guess. I do better knowing what's coming next and working with low-energy activities. I was a workbooks kind of child myself. I simply loved doing pages of little exercises. But imho home-education is about an education that fits the child (and as much as possible the family), and so this year I am going to have to make a big effort to make learning work more relaxed, happy and stimulating for my younger boys, whilst releasing my older children to take more charge of their own learning. I would really like to gradually phase out even this much structure and fall into a much more chilled educational style. I think it might be good for us all - because don't have the energy for so much nagging any more! I know my younger boys are bright, and intelligent. I am not concerned at all about their ability to learn, but I am a tad concerned about their desire to do so. Trusting the process is definitely not my strong point!! Maybe I will get there - I hope so. 

So, today the stop watches arrived (so they can know how long they've been at work on each activity, and help keep things honest) and Monday will be our first day of this new way ~ I'll let you all know how it goes at the end of the week!

Planning Post 2014 ~ with lots of links!

I am supposedly a structured home-edder at heart, but over the years I have become less and less concerned with orgo-planning. This year, however, I have had a lot to get my head around and have done more planning than in recent years.

The last few years we have used my own adaptation of the Workbox System and it has worked really well for us, but this year the children are all that bit older and in all honesty they hadn't been really 'rearranging' or moving the tickets on their charts for some time, not even to check off what they'd done. This was making it rather hard for me to see at a glance just what was being missed! It's also got harder to be SO flexible as the children grow older and they all need computers more and more for their independent work.

This year I will be educating 3 Secondary aged children;

Taz (Joel) ~ 16 ~ Yr 11.
Minnie (Abigail) ~  13.5 ~ Yr 9
TP ~ 12.5 ~ Yr 8

3 'Junior' aged children;

Lilo ~ almost 11 ~ Yr 6
DD ~ 9 ~ Yr 5
Stitch ~ 7 ~ Yr 3

And Chip ~ almost 4 ~ Pre-school.

In all honesty I do not really worry too much about formally educating my pre-schooler, but I do make sure there are plenty of educational resources around for him and additionally this year, have also decided to invest in a set of Spielgaben. My lovely Nan has offered to pay half the cost of it, and I just know he is going to LOVE it. I'm not sure how much structured time we'll realistically have with it this year, although I might try to do some, however, I know with this we have something to work with into the future :D

For the rest of us we have laminated (so they can be written on) 'timetables' that look like this;

Taz



Literature Studies (and others from Currclick)
Conquer Maths
iTooch Music
Geography & this one too (finishing off)
Science (Biology)
Alison.com Music Theory
Zoology
Another Alison.com course which he is yet to choose!! Maybe some kind of IT course.
Alison English Language/Lit course
Igniting Your Writing II
History (WW1 research)
Art Journalling 

Minnie

As with Joel and 
Bible Study
DuoLingo German
KS3 Science
Literature Studies (from Currclick) ~ Currently has Jane Ayre and Anne of green Gables on the go.
Galore Park finishing & then progressing 
Language/writing Skills
Alison.com Diploma courses in Health Studies and Childcare.

TP

Just write (3)
Editor in Chief
Grammar (not sure yet), maybe
Comprehension
iScience

Lilo

All About Spelling (hopefully level 5)
English Skills 
Explode the Code (online)
Miquon Maths (Purple)
GP Junior English (Bk 1)
'Speech to Text' story writing on the PC 
Education City Science (+ worksheets)

DD

Heinemann Maths
Reading Eggspress
Springboard
Science & THIS
Five in a Row

Stitch

Typing Dance Mat
Reading Eggspress
Conquer Maths (Yr3) and then 
Science

Me

My schedule is pretty full-on too! I would like to hope amidst all that Chip would get more than 1/2hr of my week, but this is life with 7 home-ed kids I guess!

Now, this may all look incredibly 'scheduled' but in reality most of the white blocks are quite moveable and interchangeable, so there is more flexibility in this than there may at first appear! 
The yellowy blocks are computer time and although there is some flexibility in these, in reality, for things to work smoothly with the four computers we have, these are best left as they are. I have even made 'timetables' for the computers, so as to hopefully avoid too much unnecessary waiting around for a certain one, or one at all!
The green blocks are things we do as a whole family group, blue blocks are work with either some or most of us together & the red blocks on Stitch's schedule are things he alone does with me.

The little white circles are for them to tick off each thing when it's done, and much to the teenagers' disgust, I have said I am going to look at the charts at the end of each week to see that the work is being done! It's on them to be honest though.

I anticipate some of the subjects/resources changing as the year moves on, and these will need to be updated each term I think, but it's a good starting point I think :D

Half Term Holidays

October Half Term always includes Taz's birthday, which I have already blogged, so I won't do that again! I had planned to make really good use of the week 'catching' up on things I just can't do when an education demands to be had in the house! I have achieved some of my goals, but I have also quite successfully procrastinated enough over other things to mean that we may just have to have a 'Make & Bake' week next week :) ...which is in fact another way of saying another week off!! In all fairness though, many of the children's friends are off until Wednesday, and some don't have half/term until this week, so I anticipate a few 'phone calls that will take them out of home, or mean extras around anyway - I may as well just embrace it ;)

Achieved: 

• Cleared out my wardrobe & chest-of-drawers ~ two big bin bags of clothes taken out. One went to charity shops and rag bags, the other to the loft just-in-case I ever do succeed in losing some of my excess weight. I won't be able to afford a new wardrobe then, so I have a few 'favourites' in reserve :). I also realised that Minnie was now big enough to inherit some special things I'd hung on to for rather a long time ~ namely the tops from my 'going away' outfit! They haven't dated (being bought on the Indian street stalls outside The London hospital) and she looks gorgeous in it :D. I'll post a pic next time she wears them.
• I wanted to take the children out for a walk and a 'fungus hunt' one day, so we achieved that Wednesday afternoon (Taz's birthday) by having a jaunt in Delamere forest. Taz loves it there ~ it's brilliant for biking :D
• Getting the children's clothes washed and put away ~ until the tumble dryer packed up on Friday, and now I'm behind again!
• A catch-up with my online photography course ~ which obviously means taking and editing lots of pictures ;) 
• Took Minnie charity shop shopping for a stash of winter tops. She doesn't get hand-me-downs any more, as she's taller than all her friends! And she was lacking in a winter wardrobe, so charity shops it had to be. But we did really well and she got some gorgeous clothes for a tiny fraction of what I'd have paid new. And as an added bonus we found here a great winter coat, that is trendy and she looks amazing in ~ for £6!! :D
• Enjoy having some lay-ins and easy mornings :)

Failed:

• I have a stack of marking to get through, but I have only managed to work through one and a half boy's worth! Admittedly this was the older boys work, which takes longer to mark and requires a lot more brain-power, but it is nowhere near as prolific as the girls! This leaves me with a mountain still to climb!  I'm not sure why I put it off so much. I actually don't mind it and I quite enjoy reading their work ~ it often brings a smile to my face! I need to find a way of motivating myself to do little and often, instead of letting it mount up so much. One child a night should do it, but most nights I just can't face it at the end of the day. I love teaching my kids, but I like to stop teaching them too (in a formal sense). 'School' is brought to an abrupt end three days of the week when someone has to be out and about somewhere, be it gym, swimming, prayer group, dance... Chip is often napping at this time too, so I usually take the opportunity to breath a little (usually I hit the study and catch up on the virtual world!!) ~ marking is not at the top of my 'wish list' of things to do!!
• To sort out DD's Leapfrog Explorer and try to get it synching with SOMETHING! It's a major headache ~ great toy, rubbish software ~ same old!
• To do any gardening ~ I'm woos when it comes to the cold! Paul & a friend have chopped up a lot of wood (mostly for kindling so far) and have another pile to do & he has also taken down the old trampoline frame at last, so despite no actual gardening it does look a little bit better out the back anyway. All the same ~ the overgrown shrubs at the front need hacking back for winter and I must do it soon!
• Finding the bottom of the wash-bin (for reasons already explained).

I REALLY MUST put the marking FIRST next week. It's important to me, but more than that, it is important to the CHILDREN. Taz is desperate for me to read a certain piece of work he's done!

BUT... tomorrow morning is already planned out as I need to accompany my Nanna to a hospital appointment. She hasn't been well for about three months now. She is in constant 'pain/discomfort', is gradually losing weight and her appetite is definitely not what it was. Her toilet habits have recently changed too  ~ and that is worrying her possibly the most.

She is happy in her new home, settled in and making friends, but right now she doesn't feel well enough to join in with many of the activities and is staying in her flat more than either she or I are happy with. She admits she is feeling quite 'down' but says that it's because she is fed up with feeling unwell.

She's had all sorts of blood tests since she's been up here (so in the last year), which have all been fine. But my/her GP is not happy with her symptoms, and I am glad about that, because upping pain-killers does not get to the root of the problem, plus Nan avoids taking them because they upset her tummy even more! So she's been referred to the gastroenterologist, and we have her first O.P. appointment in the morning.

The rest of the week I think we are going to, as I said, do lots of making and baking! I fancy having some kitchen sessions with the children and getting some goodies in the cupboard! Any kid-friendly recipes to recommend anyone? :) I quite fancy trying some of OTP's Cranberry and Chocolate Cookies ~ they sound mouthwatering! This baking plan does also serves a dual purpose - we have a cake-sale on Saturday to cook for, so we might do some double, double batches!!
The making will consist of some of those craft-kits we have lying around in drawers, lego, Knex, etc... Might even suggest a lego project or two ~ that tends to keep them busy for a few hours when I do!

OK ~ I'm posting now ~ it's time for Downton!!!!

To see a little extra fun/learning we did this week see here; 
http://www.frog-photoblog.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/autumn-on-farm.html

Mini-Skool!

I've been having a think and a revamp this weekend. I LOVE the workbox system, but I HATE the amount of time and energy it steals from me each night and at the weekend. I was at burnout point with it I think and simply avoiding. The kids were doing good and filling up their boxes in the mornings from my excel spreadsheet (whilst I filled just the two youngest ones' boxes), but this felt to me just like a glorified timetable with 3 times the amount of work! BUT the kids love the workboxes too, so what to do?

This is what I came up with ~ I've termed it mini-skool! The cards are diddy - there are 40 of the on one sheet of A4 (bull-dog clipped to the top of the easel at the mo'). I even have one (the yellow one in the pictures)!! The idea is basically that the children have 40 activities to complete in a week (32 in the case of TP) ~ that's 10 a day just like before. BUT instead of me filling the boxes and dictating to them what they are to do each day and the order they should do it, they will now have the autonomy to pick and choose what they fancy doing AND how much they do in any given day. All the diddy-cards on the chart are the 'must do's' and yes, there are a lot of them, but they are not all difficult and boring! Then, for the boys especially, there are few blank spaces which THEY must fill with activities of choice on Monday morning ~ choosing from the pocket chart (last picture - there's more cards in it now though). My only demand is that there are 40 completed activities by the end of the week, even if they choose to do some on Friday or Saturday. Obviously there are some taught subjects that we do as a group and these they will do when I call them to, out of necessity of not wanting to teach the same lesson over and over! This is the reason I have my own chart. You see, I am very good at disappearing into the study and doing 'my stuff' ~ OK, it is the adjoining room and I am 'available', but lately I have been very aware that this is not really good enough. SO, I have made myself an accountability chart. It's on full display to the children too, so they have ammunition against me! If I don't fulfil my duties in the week I cannot expect them to! There are four 'marking' sessions built into my week, as I tend to find that the marking just gets left until there is a mountain and then eats up my weekend :( . I have allowed myself only 2 photography/study sessions during school hours, one of which I anticipate sharing with Bugs. The rest of the time I must be where my kids are, working with them until the day is done ~ it'll be a challenge for me, but one I need to take up.

In case you were wondering; under all those diddy-cards are smiley faces. As each activity is completed the child moves the card down to the space below to reveal the smiley. At the end of the week I will expect to see 40 smilies :D

I really like this plan ~ I hope it works for everyone! I like the fact the children are going to have to take some extra responsibility for seeing that their work gets done, and at that they are in control of what they do and when. They will be able to see when they are leaving themselves too much to do another day and they will be able to feel the effects of 'ploughing through' one day to get more time to themselves another. I like the fact that they can clearly see their week laid out before them and what the expectations are, much more clearly than words on an excel sheet, or even boxes filled daily. I'm HOPING that the fact there looks to be a lot to do won't be problem to them when they get to grips with it and see the smilies appearing :D The last thing I like about it is that they can arrange their chart however they choose. SO they could choose to use the four rows as days and arrange their activities the way they plan to do them that day (or even just what they plan to do that day, but not the order), OR they can arrange the chart as I have, with blocks of subjects that they can pick from each day ~ it's entirely up to them! For the first time I really do feel that I am handing more of the control over to the children, whilst still striking the balance of ensuring that they learn what they need to. I'll let you know how it goes!!

I'm not sure yet if I am still going to need those expensive boxes I bought ... I'm thinking I may re-label them into subject sections, so that when, say TP, takes down her 'Early Comprehension' card she can then go to the 'English' section of her box and pick it out easily - already marked by me and with a sticky note in to tell her what work she needs to do next. All her English books would be in this section and all I would have to make sure to do at the weekend is rotate on her smiley-chart which ones she is to use that week. Then when I mark the work I drop it straight back into the workbox ready for when she gets to it next.

Absent Comments, Crazy Plans, Buttons and an Empty Tummy :(

I have spent most of the evening reading all my rss feeds from all the blogs that I follow - so I think that amounted to over 30 posts!! I haven't left comments on many, but consider yourselves thought of!

Today has been OK - pretty run of the mill really. Lots of EC happening today actually. Tomorrow might prove to be a little crazy but hopefully a lot of fun! The plan goes something like this;

AM - Astronomy - including finishing of a radar experiment from last term

Lunch and a playgroup pick up.

PM - make beeswax candles (activity left over from last weeks squarcle board that got postponed due to Roman day/shopping trip).

- scale drawings of whole family (measuring needed first) to enhance geography lesson this week.

  - watching BBC documentary on the Pompeii - The Last Day (courtesy of YouTube) which is about 50 minutes or so.

- doing volcano experiment again (just because it was fun!)

- watching Abbie's presentation on Australia (for English)

- Letting three of them act out a section of Melusine from Jacob's english. (He thinks that it looks like a good book so might try to track that one down for him).

- do a Spanish vocab test with Jake. 

- and anything else we can cram into the day - or maybe not!!

The good thing about a lot of this is that the littler ones can get involved a bit too :) I let you all know how it goes!

FOR THE RECORD: 

Caleb has mastered doing up buttons and peeing standing up through the 'slotted fly' on his PJ's!! I got down some old PJ's of Joel's from the loft the other day (green combat winciette material) which C fell in love with, but also decided had to be fully utilised! Hence the developmental leap forward. In the day he sits on the loo still, but in these - he stands!! And the buttons...it's so cute to watch him painstakingly trying to do up these buttons. I am amazed at his persistence and patience - he keeps going until he succeeds and does not loose the plot. There are four on the top, so just enough to make it bearable for both of us I think. And for those of you thinking it came from me you'd be wrong - the decision to do them himself was entirely his :) I think he realised if he looses patience with them he will either have to ask for help (which he so does not want to do), or end up trying over and over again!! I guess it bodes well for the future that he can concentrate that hard on something if he is really motivated to do so - and I reckon that leaves the ball in my court to find the motivators! So he can now fully cloth himself with every item except those with laces. He can do buckles, Velcro and buttons, and he can do pull-on and pull-up. 

Now we need to tackle motivating him to eat!! He is such a poor eater it breaks my heart, but I really struggle to know how to deal with it. I wasn't going to blog this, but I just think I might...

Today all he has eaten is about a quarter of a slice of toast and Marmite for breakfast, three nibbles of a ham tortilla wrap for lunch, don't know what snack at playgroup (if any) and no tea because he refused it! No crisps or chocolate because he has to eat his savoury to get them. How does a three and a half year old sustain his existence on that? This is not unusual for him either :(

Paul started a motivation chart tonight with a line from his favourite nursery rhyme: "nineteen, twenty, my plate's empty!" and the reward of a new toy car for an empty plate. Now to set him up for success he had only two tiny mouthfuls of chicken nugget (something he will sometimes eat about 6 whole ones of), a miniscule amount of potato (like half a teaspoon) and three baked beans - literally. He took one look and screamed and screamed and screamed - "I hate tea, I hate chicken!" Even though he knew he would not get the car (or pudding or sweets (we have a few sweeties at the end of our evening meal as reward for good eating/behaviour at the table) ) he persisted and went to bed on nothing in the end :( We figure tonight was a power control battle, but all the same... The scary thing is nothing motivates him more than toy cars, so this is a really tough ball game! I genuinely think he does not get very hungry and really cannot be bothered with food (not dissimilar to me in fact) but without the knowledge or rational thought that food is actually essential to our well being and therefore has to be eaten anyway! Strangely he is most often well and he seems to have a normal amount of energy, but he is very light and he is very petite for a coming up 4 in May child, so I do think his poor diet is having some effect on his growth, in that it is VERY slow (N is almost catching him up in clothes now - one size behind!). 

Here is the list of foods C will usually eat & drink; 

• ham, 
  
• 'clean' chicken (or any other meat so long as we tell him it's chicken!) - that's white breast meat with no brown cooking marks or sauces, 
  
• beef occasionally, 
  
• SOME chicken nuggets (depending on coating), 
  
• cheese, 
  
• Pepperami (if we have them), 
  
• cheese strings; 
  
• VERY occasionally a bit of boiled 'dippy' egg, or ham omelette, 
  
• Marmite and Nutella in tiny amounts on a tiny bit of bread, 
  
• milkshake & Ribena, 
  
• chocolate (just straight milk chocolate, no frills) 
  
• & Hula Hoops. 
  

Yup - that's about it!!

He won't eat any other carbohydrates, fruit or vegetables - and believe me we have tried almost everything in many forms with him - he just won't eat it!! He won't even eat those things listed if any of the 'forbidden' foods has touched them! We still put on his plate whatever we are having (this tactic has always worked with all my others who are mostly excellent eaters of most things), but often at the cost of a boy who eats nothing from it :( I have had fussy eaters before at age 2-4, but this is different and so much more extreme...

...And now N is getting all fussy on me too (but he is a hungry boy, so I'm hoping it's just an age phase with him).

HAPPY EASTER!

Hope you all had a fantastic Easter. We had our little Nathanael dedicated and all our extended family on Paul's side came for the occasion. It was a fabulous day and so great to have the whole Hampton 'dynasty' together - 13 children (plus a couple of friend's kids), four couples and P's Mum & Dad. My aunty was in Spain and my Nan had to stay home to look after the cat (don't ask!), so sadly they could not join us. I highly recommend the Sainsburys 'platters' if you ever need to cater for loads of people and want low hassle, easy clear -up, excellent, tasty food. It was enjoyed by everyone and there was masses left over for a couple of meals afterwards. It was probably only as expensive as catering myself might have been - worked out to about £3 per head and we were making it the main meal of the day, so you could get away with spending less.

After the hoards went home two of the girly cousins stayed behind for a couple of days - the girls all get on so well together. It's bliss: I haven't seen much of them all day. They have just played solidly at one thing or another with an hours worth of Hama-beading thrown in for good measure in the middle of the day J. We will take them back to Birmingham on Tuesday.

I am busy trying to plan for the new term…Hmm what shall we do? Abbie has all but finished IScience 2 (so that's the whole years work done in less than two terms - she is a quick worker), so I need to think of what to do for her. I might just get her to tread water with Science and see the year out on Education City and Brightmindsonline. That would be a nice reward for working hard J. I think she needs to be more mature in her thinking to move on up to level 3 though.

HISTORY - We're working through a project on Greece (using a EMC History Pockets - excellent), so that we will continue with.

'A Child's Geography' continues, and all the children are loving it - even the writing up bit.

ENGLISH… nothing to change or add in there. Phoebe has at last completed the Reception year Literacy on Ed' City. I just want her to finish of the 'letters and sounds' section - not that there is anything there she doesn't know, but it will be great review before we move on into Jolly Grammar and Year 1 work, where I think she will notice a change of pace. She is doing well now. She is almost a 'year behind' but I think that gap will narrow now that she has reading under her belt and everything is beginning to make more sense to her. I might start JG with her before next September if I think she is ready. Meanwhile we will tread water with 'Starfall' (including the printed materials) - again review in the 'learn to read' section, but it will build on her skills in the next level - which she can't wait to get to! I have begun to introduce joined writing to her as I think this will assist her reading and writing (it has with my others) because it flows better. She is only 'writing over' just yet and only in handwriting practice (a sentence a day). The rest of the time she can write however she likes. I usually find joining begins to happen by default after not very long.

MATHS - no changes needed there. Keep going with Miquon for the girls (once a week). Phoebe has completed SPMG Year 1 and ploughed through the first book of her Singapore MPH 1A already (a couple of weeks) and Abbie has almost finished the last part of SPMG Year2 maths, so she will go back and finish of 2B MPH (which will seem a synch to her now I'm sure). Joel is completing SPMG Year 4 (last book) having skipped the textbook work almost entirely (too easy on the whole and he could do the workbook with very little difficulty). There were very few new concepts in here, but he has enjoyed elements of it. Anyway - back to MPH 4 now and he can't wait! J Also continuing to use Smartkiddies a lot - love it!

MUSIC takes the form of Joel learning on-going piano and drumming (more-or-less self teaching), the odd bit of flute with Boo and occasionally a more formal lesson from our 'Tune-In' books - that's always fun and the little ones often join in with that too.

ART - continue with Artistic Pursuits and occasional lessons from 'teachartathome' freebies.

I'd like to spend some time this term doing a review of the years learning, so that the children have a real sense of what they have achieved this year…need to think about that some more and how I can put that together. I don't want to re-teach it (in case of having forgotten any!), but to help them to see just how much we've covered in a year and how much more they know now than in September! It might just blow my mind - let alone theirs!!

And then of course I am starting to think about having Jake home again next year (Yr 7) and what we will use for him… It's not so far away now and I want him to be happy with the materials I choose. So far I have this as a starting point;

Writing Strands - pitching in at level 4, with level 3 to hand as a fall back. He had a look at the books the other day and felt he could tackle level four, so I'm going on his judgement, and I think he is probably right.

English Grammar (for students) - to help tighten up his grammar.

Mathematics AU - because I think I might be asking for trouble if I start him back on Singapore Maths - he has unhappy memories of 3^rd edition! Not only that, but he might test in at the same level as his brother which would not be good for his self esteem (although it might work out ok in other ways). I MAY buy him the MPH (level 4) workbooks too and see if he can pull up a little. I think Singapore maths would be more stretching, but he would not be ready for the higher levels (any of them) and the Maths AU will be more than adequate for him to attain what he needs to. I like the fact that there is a built-in reporting system with this too, which would be useful in the long-run.

Science - probably go with Singapore I-Science, either at level 7, or maybe even as low as level 5, because he is not fantastic at science, by his own admission he does not have that kind of mind, and this is where Joel will be at, so it might be fun for them to work together on stuff - or it might cause fights - not sure! I also have Exploring Creation with Astronomy on my shelf which we could spend a year working through with everyone and that would be great fun I think, especially if I pair it with the Live-n-Learn lapbook to go with it, although Joel is not keen on covering 'space' - however I think they would enjoy it when they got going with it.

History - He'll have to jump in where we are at, which might be round about Romans by then. I know he has done Rome in school, but not like we do it! And that will just mean he can build on his knowledge and help me out a bit!

Geography - He'll do what we do and I'll assign him appropriate work.

Music - likewise

Art - likewise, although I do have higher grade material, if he wants to work through that more independently.

RE - I guess we will need to start looking at some other belief systems pretty soon, but I want to tread carefully with this, as, of all of my children, Jake is the least certain of his faith. I might, therefore, spend his first year at home going over some of the basics of our own faith, chatting with him tonnes and shoring him up before we go exploring!

Languages - he has done a lot of French at school (one of the teachers is Maurtian) and I'd like to keep that going, so may need to invest in something like Le facile Francaise, as my French is too rusty (and never really was that good) to go solo teaching it. Coupled with Ed' City I think that should do it J

I think that will get us going J

Sorry if I bored you all - but making a record even for myself can be helpful at times!