Several reasons for my absense, one of which was 24 hours without access to the blog but now I’m back. Not sure for how long as it’s looking like a busy old end of the week coming up and I’m fairly sure blogging will slide down my priorities list 😉
Sunday – Went to Drusillas with my parents. Had a nice time walking round and looking at the animals etc before getting some lunch. It always amazes me that given me and the children spend so much time together during the week when they have the chance to be with Ady or Granny and Grandad they still both tend to choose me. I ended up walking round most of the place with a child holding each hand :-). It’s pretty mutual though really as if I have the chance to go off out somewhere without them it’s nice but if I’m there too then I struggle not to be the main one interacting with them / pointing stuff out. Sometimes it’s nice to have a reminder that we are mainly together so much through choice ;-).
We went to the playground area after lunch and were joined by Ros and The Screamteam which was great. Davies and Scarlett got to run around with Pea, Boo and Buzz, Ros got to meet my parents (she’d met Dad briefly before but not my mum) and I think they all bonded very well! (Ros is physically much more suited to my family than me actually, Mum and indeed Tarly are more your petite blondes – infact Mum probably is Ros in about 25 years time :-). Infact if Ros didn’t look so much like her own family too I would suspect cuckoos at work 31 years ago! 😉
Monday – Went to a soft play centre with Mel, Liam and Lily (friends who go to school – half term). It poured with rain all day and was windy and otherwise horrid so I expected the worst from a soft play centre on a rainy day in half term, but it was not too busy. The kids had a great time, just ran off and got stuck in really, we had lunch there and then went back to Mel’s for a couple of hours playing too. We’ve not been there before as she lives with her mum and they also have three big dogs (which I am terrified of!) but I braved my fears and it was fine. Nice to see her in her own home, it always sort of completes the picture of someone once you have seen both their house, and how they are in it, you get a more accurate idea of what they are really like. (My theory anyway, which is why I am always slightly cagey about people coming to our house, it is not an invite I throw out casually anyway.)
Tuesday – my granny came round in the morning, she stayed a couple of hours and played snakes and ladders with the children for ages. In the afternoon we nipped out to get a few bits and pieces.
Davies, particularly has been quite challenging the last couple of days. After a couple of lovely days in the house last week I think they have had their fill of that for a while again (although that said they are playing happily now together upstairs, pretending to be on holiday!) and squabbles have broken out frequently over vry trivial things. Scarlett tends to lash out quite a bit and thinks nothing of snatching or walloping him and sadly he has started to hit back. I suppose I was very naive to think they would never get physical particularly as I clearly recall me and Frazer beating each other, but I have been coming down very, very hard on them both over it in a sort of zero tolerance fashion as even if I know it will happen I still want them to realise it’s not OK. Sigh, stuff 🙁
Also had a sticky moment with Davies and Granny yesterday when he pulled out a maths workbook from the bookcase. We’ve never done any sort of structured maths stuff and although I know his numeracy is fine and developing OK it is not done within the context of 3+4=7 type stuff, which is what the question she pulled out was. Together they worked it out as 7 and then she got him to write 7. His attempt was a sort of upside down 7, not right, but kind of there if you know what I mean. I would have corrected him and talked it through. I’m sure it rolled off his back but I could really tell she was thinking that he is not where he should be. Which has then played on my mind and given me niggles about autonomy. Not anything serious or any real doubts about it for us, but concerns about how it will prove itself short term to others. And I guess the answer is that it won’t, but I’m not feeling up to explaining and justifying just now.
This is sort of not the blog post I had intended writing really, but I need to go out now, so I’ll press send and might be back later to add to it. I’ve more to say but not sure whether here is the place to say it…
I still don’t know your mums name though!
Comment by Roslyn — 26 October 2005 @ 1:58 pm
Given they aren’t expected to be able to add and subtract numbers to the value of 20 until the end of Year 3, i really wouldn’t worry. We didn’t begin any structured Maths with fran till she was gone 6 and now she is easily as able as her “year group” – granny’s will be granny’s but, i say it though i know it won’t actually help (!), don’t worry 😉
Comment by Merry — 26 October 2005 @ 2:01 pm
i agre with Merry, we do do some structured maths – as SB enjoys match and sort. we have been doing far less than I actually wanted at the moment, but today playing with the cubes, she was adding and subtracting and even loking at halves. Face her with 4 plus 3 written down, and she’d get it wrong. tell her that if I had 4 sweeties, and she had 3, she could have mine if she added them up, I’d bet she’d get it right!
on another note, since we are now coming to the party – is there a list of stuff you wanted people to contribute or something?
Comment by HelenJ — 26 October 2005 @ 2:33 pm
Hiya
I too agree about the written maths thing. Leo has all sorts of snippets of mathematical knowledge which he has picked up when they are relevant to something he is interested in. But nearly all his numerals come out backwards when he writes them down, and he often has no idea where to start with a ‘problem’.
How old are Davies and Scarlett? I am hoping to prime Leo with a bit of info about the kids he is likely to meet in the hopes it will make him more friendly on Saturday. He is great once he knows people but can be a bit wary with new faces.
Comment by Allie — 26 October 2005 @ 2:50 pm
Thanks all 🙂 Having all sorts of wobbles over all sorts of things atm and just didn’t need someone pointing out that something in a 4-5 years workbook was beyond my 5yo I guess!
I am normally so confident about what we’re doing HE wise and can so obviously see the massive plusses Davies has over schooled peers in so many other ways, such as a massive general knowledge and snippets of all sorts of things which have cropped up that many adults wouldn’t know. But I do ‘trust the process’ and believe in what we’re doing, its harder to justify to someone who the whole concept would be so alien to. Ah well!
Davies is five and Scarlett is nearly 3 (December) Allie.
About to do a final Halloween infornmation post to hopefully answer any last questions 🙂
Comment by Nic — 26 October 2005 @ 3:44 pm
I don’t think the success of an autonomous education is something that can be proven tbh, it’s more of a faith thing 🙂 Or at least, the proof will be seen in the adult they turn into. It’s certainly not an argument that should be won or lost over details.
Comment by Alison — 26 October 2005 @ 4:02 pm
FWIW they don’t encourage writing in “our” school until the summer term of Reception so had he just gone into year one he would only just be at the beginning of learning to write anyway. K (5 in Feb) can do the actual maths in anything up to a 5-6 maths book but just hasn’t got the fine motor skills to write the answers down. His sevens are back to front L’s! Boys take longer to get the hang of fine motor stuff anyway so just do some work on that for a while and I bet his writing will leap on. A recommended activity from the reception teacher is playing in shaving foam, needless to say mine love that!
Comment by SallyM — 27 October 2005 @ 2:11 pm