We had a trip to   the Erasmus Darwin House in Lichfield this week. It was fascinating. Erasmus Darwin was Charles Darwin’s Grandfather and was a doctor.

There was some very interesting history in the house and then the children had the opportunity to do a couple of workshops. One was a dissection workshop and the other was making herbal remedies.

The people leading the workshops were extremely knowledgeable and a great time was had by all.

Location of body parts

location of body parts

Making toothpaste

Making toothpaste

There are regular workshops here, so I think we will be going back.

Amanda Goldston

Tags: children, fun, home education by Amanda
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We went crate stacking at Blackwell Court in Worcestershire. Jacqueline had a brilliant time. It is a terrific place with several acres of woodland, an outdoor pool and an adventure play area.

All the children seemed to have a great time.

A local MP from Worcestershire came along to talk to parents about Home Education and the BadMan Review.

Tags: children, fun, home education by Amanda
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We seem to have had a very busy couple of weeks, since school officially “started back”, both on the educational side and on the battling DCSF and officialdom front.

On the battling front, there have been some interesting twists and turns. Last week Graham BadMan suddenly sent out a letter to all the Local Authorities, begging them to send him some last minute evidence to substantiate his claims of abuse amongst the home education community.

It seems that his “substantial numbers” and “significant high numbers” and other vague terms are crashing under the demands of home educators for some concrete figures and numbers to support his claims. In other words, this is a classic case of “policy-based- evidence” or make up the policies you want then try to find any evidence to support those policies, if it becomes necessary.

Perhaps I should send them a bill for at least £500 an hour (approximately equivalent to an MPs salary) for all the time I have had to spend responding to their attacks and other nonsensical consultations.

After the announcements about the new vetting scheme for adults having contact with children, I don’t feel quite so alone any more because it is now every adult is a potential child abuser ( and a danger to children) and not just home educating parents.

Ed Balls informed us  in the Sunday papers that he is planning to save £2 billion from the education budget by getting rid of teachers, yet, in the same week he is proposing that 300,000 school children should have a private tutor to help with Maths and English! How can that possibly be????? – children falling behind in school!!!!!!Dear, oh, dear!

Anyway, back to our home education. That is easier to fathom than the drivel that comes out of Westminster.

Stephanie is busy preparing for her exams in November, so we had a trip to Snibston Discovery Park in Leicestershire to reinforce some of the science experiments for her.

books and printing

electricity

magnetism

see-saw

We went with another home educating family and had a really good day. It was so quiet and peaceful there.

Later in the week we went to the 300th birthday celebrations of the author Samuel Johnson, better known as the man who compiled the first dictionary. There were some interesting effects, as the visual presentation was projected onto the side of his house.

Samuel Johnson

words on the house

Other than that, Jacqueline has been busy writing stories and they are both progressing nicely towards their next LAMDA exams.

Stephanie has been busy doing past exam papers for her Maths, Chemistry, Physics and Biology exams and we have gone back to our old favourite Maths site for Jacqueline, which is the CIMT Plymouth site.

Jacqueline has now been back at Guides for 2 weeks and the weeks are flying past. Girl Guiding UK is having a year long celebration for 100 years of Girl Guiding, with lots of different activities planned. She is making good progress with her trampolining. She has been doing that 12 weeks so far!

This week she also finished painting her house and her pots from the last pottery course, with a new course starting soon. As far as I know, the next projects include a clock, a dragon and possibly wind chimes, so that should be intgeresting.

Life seems to move forward at a rapid pace. I am so glad I am able to spend this time with my children as they are growing up.

Amanda Goldston

Tags: children, home education by Amanda
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Debs Scudder has put together a fantastic Carnival of Home Education Blogs

These are all written by home educating families and all I can say is “Wow, what a huge diversity of families and approaches to home education!”

The Carnival of Blogs covers everything from reasons why families home educate, to daily life, to a structured approach (or semi structured like ours), to a totoally autonomous approach, to anger at the BadMan Review and everything else in between.

Well done, Debs! It is a fantastic insight into home education in the UK.

There is definitely NO “one size fits all”, which is going to create an interesting situation for the Balls and Morgan Army of Social Workers, Education Welfare Officers and other Interfering Busy-Bodies, who are supposed to be passing judgment both on the suitability of home education being provided and the eligibility of the families  in question to ‘deliver’  said education at home!

Well, at least that will stuff up their “tick-box” system!

Thank you, Debs for putting this together and thank you to everyone who has contributed.

Carnival of Home Education Blogs

Amanda Goldston

Tags: children, home education by Amanda
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One of the recommendations of the BadMan review is that all Home Educating families have to provide an Educational Plan for the following 12 months, drawn up – of course- with the supportive guidance of the Local Authority! (LOL)

As this is the official  start of a new school year, I thought it would idea to look at some of the things we are proposing to do  the next 12 months. Some of them are measurable, such as the IGCSE exams and LAMDA exams, but most are not.

Those last two things alone render any proposed interference by the Local Authority totally meaningless because they are unlikely to have a clue what they are, let alone how to monitor them.

IGCSEs are not recognised by the government, so it is very unlikely that any social worker/education welfare office/headteacher/psychologist/Local Authority person will have come across them.

Some of the activities we will be doing, in no particular order:

Stephanie: ICGSEs in Maths, Physics, Biology and Chemistry (Nov 2009), English Language, ICT and Environmental Science (Summer 2010), LAMDA (London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts) Grades 6/ 7 (medal level and worth university UCAS points), Languages, Dancing, Online Social Media Marketing, Film watching, Theatre attending, cooking and baking and dog walking.

Jacqueline: Maths, English, ICT, Astronomy, LAMDA Grades 4/5, Writing, Book Publishing, Photography and Photoshop, Trampolining, Swimming, Girl Guides, Baden Powell Challenge, Drama Workshops, Theatre Attending, Film Watching, Cooking and Baking, Dog Walking,  Readers Club at the Library and Pottery.

Some of the proposed trips include, Cresswell Crags (Ice Age caves), Buxton Caves, Manchester Science Museum, Snibston Discovery Park, Science Museum and Natural History Museum in London, Jorvik Viking Centre in York, Zoo Keeper for a Day, Lecture on Charles Darwin – to mention but a few. That excludes any activities that may be organised by home educating groups.

So we are going to be very busy and under the scrutiny of  a lot of CCTV cameras in public places and coming into contact with a lot of “trained professionals”, which rather excludes any need for intrusive visits into our home!

Amanda Goldston

Tags: children, home education by Amanda
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This is a brilliant blog post by Home Educating Parent, Ann Newstead, about the implications of the BadMan Review into Elective Home Education for Home Educating Families

Here is the link to the post.

http://fivehomeedinkent.blogspot.com/2009/08/for-all-my-non-home-educating-friends.html

I really could not have said it better myself.

Amanda Goldston

Tags: children, dcsf by Amanda
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Well, the summer seems to have flow by! Although we have not been away this Summer, we seem to have been really busy.

Jacqueline has done two theatre and drama workshop weeks, one with a home education friend and one on her own. Both performances were really terrific. In the first one, the children put together a fantastic performance of “Thriller” where they learnt a very complex dance and made all their zombie costumes themselves.

The second was a piece that was written entirely by the children themselves. It was about “Grandad’s diary” and was a journey through the decades.

It never ceases to amaze me how much can be accomplished in only a week!

Jacqueline has also been camping with her cousins. She also went on a canal boat trip with Guides and managed to fall in the canal!

We had an Italian student to stay for a couple of weeks and that was great fun. We had several days out including a trips to Lichfield Cathedral, Birmingham Art Gallery and Stratford Upon Avon.

We also went to see a fabulous production of “Wind in the Willows” by Heartbreak Productions Outdoor Theatre company.

Stephanie has been getting ready for her first four IGCSE exams, which she is taking in November. As they are science subjects, we are going to Snibston Discovery Park again in a couple of weeks, to have another look at the different experiments.

Jacqueline has been busy trampolining each week and Stephanie is starting dancing classes in a couple of weeks.

We have continued with Speech and Drama throughout the Summer. With the last set of exam results, Stephanie now has her first 35 UCAS points towards University. By the time she goes to University, she will have a considerable number of UCAS points and will have worked to the level that is just below teacher level.

She has been looking at College courses for next year and then University courses there after. Time flies past so past and education continues every day!

Amanda Goldston

Tags: children, home education, igcse by Amanda
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