No hangover...

... so must really try harder next time. :) Had a great night out, the girls all survived quite happily without me, and DH had even taken them for a walk in the woods (all three of them!) plus dog by the time I got home. Didn't do the supermarket nonsense, though - couldn't face fighting through the scrum.

Does everyone wake up on a Sunday morning and go 'I know, let's go to Asda/Tesco/Sainsbury's, seeing as how it's our day off...' ? What is it about Sunday shopping? Like these people don't have anything better to do. I know I go on Sunday's occasionally, but that's because I can dump small peopleon DH and I can fly around the store unhindered by requests for grapes, long bread, chocolate mini rolls etc etc. Everyone else seems to treat it like a family day out! Mum, Dad, squally kids, Granny with her zimmer frame. Gee, there's our excitement for the week - a bottle of ketchup got broke on aisle 9 you know... left terrible wheel marks when we ran the trolley through it.

Sorry, I digress. Maybe I've still got a little black russian running through my veins. I haven't had one of those in ages, and had two to finish the evening off last night. Yum.

Now I'm going to clear up the chaos DH left in the kitchen and try and put the dining room back into some kind of order. 'No problems,' says he. 'I can look after kids.' Yeah, but what about everything else? lol. He did fold a load of laundry though, which is a bonus. Shouldn't complain too much though - poor sod has had to go to work today. Doing a wedding fayre - mm, exciting. Would probably rather go to the supermarket...

Night out!

Well, whoda thunk it? I'm off out for a girlie night out. Just me and a pal, Lisa, and we're hitting the high spots of Doncaster (both of them).

Small problem, though - it's races night. And although I know it's a huge bonus for the town, the drunken population of the High Street doubles... you've never seen so many completely pi**ed up people in your entire life. All wildly over dressed wearing next to nothing (yes, I do mean that) and completely off their trolleys. And probably have been since about 3pm.

Oh well. We're just going to get pleasantly inebriated in a quiet corner somewhere and watch the world go by - and laugh. :) And I'm not even going home - I'm going to stay over the night as a taxi back out here would cost anywhere between £15 and £20. So I'll sleep on her nice squashy sofa and then do a quick supermarket sweep before heading home in the morning. Where hopefully DH and the girls will be so happy to have me back that everyone will behave themselves for the rest of the week.

Ha.

What every pupil should know...

Taken from today's Telegraph, reproduced in full with no permission whatsoever... (and yes, I am in a better mood) :)


What every pupil should know about Britain - By Toby Helm (Filed: 27/01/2005)

Children up to the age of 16 will be given compulsory history lessons about great British heroes such as Lord Nelson, Sir Francis Drake and Isambard Kingdom Brunel, under Conservative plans to restore respect for the nation's heritage.

In a speech today Tim Collins, the shadow education secretary, will describe the low level of historical knowledge among young Britons as a "farce" and an "outright scandal".

Mr Collins will claim that ignorance about those who fought for the country and shaped its democratic traditions down the centuries helps explain why so many people do not respect tradition or figures of authority and fail to vote in elections.
Mr Collins will cite a comprehensive knowledge of British history as being essential to the preservation of Britain as a nation state.

"Nothing is more important to the survival of the British nation than an understanding among its young of our shared heritage and the nature of the struggles, foreign and domestic, which have secured our freedoms," he will tell the National Catholic Heads conference. "A nation which loses sight of its past cannot long expect to enjoy its future."

Mr Collins has asked the historian Andrew Roberts to draw up a list of "key facts" about British history that all children must be taught, and have learned, by the time they leave school.

"What once 'every schoolboy knows' is now unknown by almost every schoolboy and schoolgirl in the land," Mr Collins will say.

"We cannot be surprised that some within the next generation do not value our parliamentary democracy if they know nothing of the English Civil War, do not vote if they are not taught about the struggles to widen the franchise, and do not value any authority figures if they are not told the inspiring tales of the national heroes of our past."

Mr Collins will admit that the Tory government made the initial mistake when it introduced the rule under which students can drop history at 14.
"It was a Conservative Government which permitted that change, although Labour has stood by it.

"The next Conservative Government will admit our error and restore history to the heart of the curriculum studied until the age of 16."

He will add: "When surveys show that nearly a third of all 11- to 18-year-olds think that Oliver Cromwell fought at the Battle of Hastings and when fewer than half know that Nelson's ship at Trafalgar was called HMS Victory, we have to take action."
Recent studies have revealed that 30 per cent of 11- to 18-year-olds do not know in which century the First World War took place while one in 10 Britons thinks that Hitler was not a real person.

Soft play day... and then a gripe

We've had a fun day so far. Apart from DH sleeping through his alarm and being late to work - o Monday, o joy - it was a good start to the day. We were up, breakfasted, dressed and out of the house for 9.30am. I don't know why this is such an achievement these days - we used to do all that and be at school for 8.45am. However, I think it's much nicer to not have to panic and rush and worry about being 10 minutes late (we were ultimately about 30 minutes late, but hey, I blame traffic).

We all piled in the Disco, after much swearing by me when I discovered the trunk was FULL of DH's junk. Tow ropes and a trolley jack, steel toe capped boots, strops, D-links, flask, water proof trousers, bag of rubbish, and boot liner all had to be removed before I could set the rear 2 seats up for D & T to sit in. Then we went and fetched a local friend, Lou and her gorgeous little daughter W, who's the same age as F, and headed off to Sheffield to meet up with Barbara, E, B and R, and also Stella, K and J, at a little soft play centre she'd told me about on Saturday.

And if you made it through that cumbersome paragraph, well done! Sorry, having an off day... can't type, can't spell and the words aren't really putting themselves in the proper order at the mo. I hate it when that side of my brain goes on hold... my spatial awareness suffers too and I go all girly and useless. Time of the month and all that bloody nonsense, no pun intended. I loathe it when I can't compute ordinary day-to-day stuff like judging distance, reading maps etc.

Although I did take us straight to the soft play centre today, from south of Doncaster to the middle of Sheffield, with only a single cursory glance at the AtoZ. Hormones must have kicked in on the way home then...

Where was I? Dunno... have lost the impetus to write. Will come back later when I've nuked a wheat bag for my poorly belly. And maybe with a glass of something warming to ward off the dreary chill of the miserable, grey, sleet-soaked day that is glowering at me through the window. So much for the stirring promise of spring that had been in the air the past week or so. The snowdrops are drooping under the relentless wind and rain, the tiny touches of green have been beaten from the gnarled hawthorn twigs, and the birds are huddled miserably along the edge of the compost heap, trying to draw some warmth from the rotting vegetation.

And before I depress myself even further, I'm off.

The Nutcracker

What a lovely day we've had. Really, really lovely in every sense of the word.

I dropped T and F at Grandma's at about 11am, stopped for a chat, then drove across to Sheffield to Barbara's and even got there on time for once. :) We had lunch with them (gorgeous lamb stew, kind of like a stove-top version of moussaka, with chickpeas and aubergines, and sprinkled with feta cheese, served over couscous... mmmm), and then Barbara, E and her mother-in-law, D and myself all climbed in Barbara's car for the drive across Sheffield to the Lyceum.

There, we met up with Jax and Big, Jan and C. Check out Jax's blog for a much better description of the day than I can manage in my tired and fuzzy state of mind.

But one thing I have to say - I am so proud of D I could burst. The changeling the aliens left for me a couple of days ago is the most amazing creature any mother could wish to have. She behaved wonderfully in the theatre, played with E most contentedly once back at Barbara's for tea and a book borrowing session (lol), and then chatted aimiably all the way home, dozing in between observations about Barbie, Nutcracker, music and men who don't wear trousers whilst dancing in white tights. :)

Homework helper...

Homework is history, says Head

hmm

Cbeebies.co-operative play!

The girls have suddenly discovered cbeebies on line. Not quite sure why they haven't demanded it before - tbh, I think I've been remarkably successful at keeping them off my computer. However, now we have a separate machine for them to beat up on, I figured it was time to start the ICT part of our curriculum. :P

And, not surprisingly I suppose, both D and T have taken to it rapidly. D's mouse control is obviously much better than T's, but I discovered they were actually
taking turns at doing things today. I stood in the kitchen, peeping through the doorway in total disbelief as D pointed to the screen and told T where to point and click, and then she took control of the mouse and did another bit, then gave the mouse back to T, etc. I was stunned.

So, ICT seems to be a popular subject in this house. Will be doing more of that I think. See if I can get D writing emails to Nanny in Birmingham.

We also popped into town - managed to catch the bus at the time I was aiming for, which was another bonus. Knackered F completely - she slept for over 2 hours once home. Whilst we were out, we picked up some onion sets, a packet of black pansies and some more sunflower seeds (at D's request). Like we need anymore ruddy sunflower seeds... lol


Oh - have just remembered where I hid a large envelope of seed I bought a couple of months ago and 'forgot' to tell DH about... better sidle over to Muddy Musings and update that list. :D

This morning...

Well - it seems to be going along the same lines as yesterday. Obviously the aliens haven't returned my daughter yet. But they will be pleased with the changeling when they take her back - we've learnt some signing (from Cbeebies), done more colouring, ate all our breakfast (after making it herself), and scolded her baby sister for drawing on the walls in green felt tip, but in a nice way.

All that and it's only 9.30am.

However, today is another bus day. Due to DH taking a few days off this week for one reason or another, his work van was left at work - so he took the Disco to work this morning. We're all going to finish getting dressed (half naked little people tearing around the living room as we speak), and then catch the bus into town. The buggy is in the back of the truck, so we'll go do some market shopping for fresh stuff and then get home in time for lunch and naps.

At which point, I guess I should do something about the laundry monster that is threatening to take over the entire landing, and maul passing children. That's if I can evict the dog, who now considers it his new bed. He makes himself a nest in the heap and snores.

A Eureka! moment

It seems this home-schooling lark is just one long series of self-doubting lows interspersed with a few 'okay' days at the moment - and then you get get a day like today. :)

It started off innocuously enough - a request by D for 'some colouring and work stuff that you print off the computer, please Mommy'. So I browsed around and printed off a huge batch of Cbeebies colouring-in pages, then some simple maths worksheets and a few ideas for writing.

Well, not only did they all set too with a willingness that surprised me, they all did extrememly well! T has suddenly discovered the joy of actually colouring the picture, as opposed to the paper. She also did some drawing later, and produced some recognisable patterns, faces and so on. F had fun scribbling on anything that came within reach.

However, D amazed me. She carefully coloured in four pictures, all in 'real' colours, as she put it. "And I either stayed in the lines, too Mommy." (Not sure why she keeps using either instead of even). Then she asked to see the work papers, and we sat and did some maths worksheets together! Lots of subtracting, using a number line, adding up using dice, then some mental arithmetic once we'd done all the sums on the sheet. And she got it - grasped the number line concept in a matter of minutes. :) Proud momma, or what?

Add to that she ate all of her dinner without complaint, picked up most of the stuff lying around in the living room before hand, hardly yelled at her siblings all day and even was first into her pyjamas with no fuss... Of course, I fully expect the aliens to return my real daughter tomorrow, but hey, I enjoyed today enormously.

And it's also not bad when you consider I seemed to spend half the day on this ruddy machine, sorting out seeds and varieties and stuff, and writing up a blurb to go in with the seeds... although I think I got a bit carried away and I may have to cut down what I've written. Tend to get sidetracked when rambling on about seeds and gardening. Don't think 5yo's are ready for 2 pages of vegetative mutterings. But will take myself off to Muddy Musings to explain further. :)

Seeds!

I've had a lot of positive feedback about this seed thing I'm thinking about doing. (see post below!) So, a quick poll for those of you who are interested, if you wouldn't mind. You can either respond in a comment, or you can reply to poledragon@yahoo.co.uk.

1. What kinds of veggies would you like to see in the pack?
2. How many types would be appropriate?
3. What kind of instructions should I put in? How about a sheet to record findings? Or am I getting ahead of myself here? :)
4. Solutions to the money side of things - if I've got 10 people asking for seed, then that's not a problem. If I get 20+, then I might have to ask for a contribution to cover postage. Or do I just charge a pound or two?

Um, there are probably lots of other questions that I should be asking, but for now, I can't think of them. How about I just ask for suggestions and leave it at that?

(oh, and btw, my spinning wheel is an Ashford Traveller)

Bradway meet today

Just managed to post this blog without writing a word... let's try again, shall we?

Went to the meet at Bradway today - took munchkins and a spinning wheel, as Jax had told me we were 'doing' wool. Fine by me, I thought. Eventually tracked my mother-out-law down and retrieved said wheel, as it's been stored at her house for nearly 18 months. No room in this little house for it. :(

However, arrived at hall within 1/2 hour of starting, so that was a bonus for us. Brought kids in, then went back to retrieve wheel. Lots of 'oohs' and 'ahhs' when I walked in with it. Most gratifying. lol

The kids did weaving on cardboard leaving wombs... I mean, weaving looms. Couldn't talk properly today, which Sarah found most amusing. :P Ok, so one day I will engage brain before trying to interact with other people. Dino was a star today though - he understood what I was on about! He was also most fascinated with the wheel, so it looks like I'm off to north Derbys at some point with wheel and wool. :)

I have had a bit of a brainwave though, as regards home-ed kids and gardening. Mainly thanks to Dino and Sarah and our discussion on how he wanted to grow and eat his own veg!

I think I might be putting together some home-ed packages of seed. I have so many kinds of seed, and there's no way I can hope to plant them all in the next few years. I'm thinking, off the top of my head, that if I put 4 or 5 of each kind of seed, say a pumpkin and a runner bean, some sunflowers and french beans and maybe a courgette, a tomato and a lettuce... put them together in a little envelope, with some growing instructions, and make it into a home-ed style project. And then get the kids to record what they grow, when they plant the seeds, how many germinate, what kind of stuff grows, what they did with the veg, if they ate it or gave it to elderly aunts etc, and get them to grow some seed for following years. We could even have a competition for the longest French bean, or the biggest pumpkin. :)

Have cross-posted this to the other blog, just to get more feedback. If I get much interest, I'll post full details on the Muddy Musings blog.

Mellow day

Didn't do a huge amount at all. Oops, LEA inspector wouldn't want to read that, would he?

But we just chilled. Read a few stories, did a bit of cutting and sticking. Read the words on our word tree again. Played with the words on the fridge (magnetic poetry kit for kids - fab!). Talked about when to sow seeds in the garden and why we can't do it in winter time. Took Daddy's lunch into town for him, then came home, ate our own lunch and had a little nap.

In between times, I typed up the father-in-law's speech for his golf thingy tomorrow (he's this year's Captain so we all have to be present and correct and presentable at the Golf Club tomorrow for inaugral lunch etc), did some laundry, prepped dinner and spent far too much time on eBay. :::sigh:::

Sum total of today. Well, I guess it is a Saturday.

Yesterday Lesley came round and we talked about having a meeting with Eyebal et al. And also the possibility of setting up a local Doncaster meet, say once a fortnight for local home edders to meet up and talk whilst the kids run around and 'socialise'. Just need to find a venue that isn't too expensive, and is fairly central to Doncaster. And also - we need to find the home edders! According to Mr Eyebal, there are 90+ families that he sees that home educate in and around Doncaster. We need to find these people!

Any one have any suggestions how? We're going to put up posters in all the local libraries as well as the Central library, but apart from that - there's only a dozen in the EO contact list.

Not a bad day

Well, first we got to playgroup almost on time. That makes twice in one week! Will wonders never cease...

And then, after lunch, Jax & co came round for a bit of 'socialisation'. We got to sit at the table and actually hold a half decent converstion whilst D, T & Big demolished D's bedroom, and Small and F did likewise to the living room. It was great. :)

Bloggable quote of the day has to go to D though. F was suspiciously fragrant at one point, but had scarpered out of reach.

"Does that baby smell?" I asked D, who was closer. D narrows her eyes at F, then runs out of the room.

"No," she says over her shoulder. Pause. "She stinks!"

Well, it was funny at the time...

Garden blog online!

From the sublime to the ridiculous... first I don't post for a month, then I go and post half a dozen times in two days, and open a new blog!

Oh well.

Muddy Musings is now online - http://poledragon2.blogspot.com/

All the horticultural hocus pocus you could ever desire. And no doubt there'll be a few other ramblings in there, as I tend to get philosophical when grubbing about in the dirt. :)

Just when you're about to give up

After this morning's announcement of D wanting to go back to school, I was about ready to go hide in a corner somewhere and contemplate my navel, for all the use I felt I was as a home edder.

But then, this afternoon, D actually sat down at the table with a pencil and a piece of paper and started writing words. She wanted to add to the word tree, and so wrote Nanny, hat, sat, hen, mat and love on a sheet of blank leaves. And then we talked about cursive writing and I did the alphabet for her in her notebook. And then she copied some letters. Got bored and asked for a piece of A4. Ten minutes later, she was presenting me with a menu for her cafe. Pictures of sausages and beans and a fried egg, and some bananas and a tea pot, tea cup and milk jug. We put prices on and she took my order and we added up the total.

In between times, I started dinner, filled the sink with water then got sidetracked on some project or other, and next thing I know, she's in the sink washing up. She wanted to help, she said. So, instead of chasing her out of the kitchen like I normally do (small kitchen, lots of stuff in a little space), I let her. Washed dishes. A not even damp floor. And a happy D.

Plus, we've also got a happy Mommy. I overheard her at playgroup this morning telling someone how she liked not going to school. And whilst they all had a nap this afternoon, I got an hour's good digging in the front garden, to tidy it up somewhat. Dinner is in the oven (some concoction of chicken, tomatoes, white wine, etc etc... had to open a bottle of wine though, as I need a couple of glasses in the casserole... damn, means I'll have to drink what's left...)

Shame. :)

F - after having been given 8 whole smarties, and eating them one by one, disemboweling each smartie to lick the chocolate out of the middle before crunching what was left of the sugar shell. I didn't know there was that much chocolate in 8 smarties. Let alone that it could be spread over that much surface area. Surely that must class as a science experiment of sorts?

New week, old routine

Hurray - DH is back to work, all playgroups have restarted, regular routine is now theoretically achievable.

I hadn't realised how much I'd missed my old pre-festive-season routine. The kids love having DH at home, but he doesn't half throw my day out of sync. We have been getting on much better recently, though, so maybe things aren't all doom and gloom there.

Today we're off to our normal Mon/Wed playgroup. It's the one I used to help run before D came out of school. I suppose I should still be helping to run it, but I hardly seem to have been there the past few months. Still, it means we've to be out of the house for 9.45am. A technically feasible feat, seeing as how we used to be up, fed, dressed and out for 8.45am. But, as it's now 9.15, and the small people are still running round in pyjamas, albeit breakfasted, I'm not sure we will be out on time. And, add to that the fact I'm tapping away on this blasted machine...

D threw me slightly this morning though - came into my bedroom first thing, after DH had gone to work. "I miss my school friends, mommy. I still have my old uniform, don't I?" I agreed that yes, we still have the uniform. Why? Did she want to go back to school? "Yes please. Well, I think I do."

Gah. Just what one needs on a Monday morning. So I explained that she couldn't go back to school in the middle of the year, but if she still wanted to go back after the summer, then we'd talk about it more. Sound fair? Workable? I did say we'd ask one of her friends round for tea sometime this week and that seemed to cheer her up. Maybe kids sense more of what is going on around them than we give them credit for. DH and I haven't exchanged a cross word in front of them, leaving all the heavy conversation until after they are in bed, but sometimes...

And on a more cheerful gardening thread, I've had a number of people comment about our gardening activities. So, I might open a new blog for gardening stuff - what I'm planting, when, how etc etc. Can't promise I'll stick to just gardening things - I tend to get philosophical when grubbing around in the dirt. Will probably digress and cross post and generally waffle away there too, but I should be able to indulge my anorak-ish passion for rare, heirloom and open-pollinated seeds, and ramble away to my heart's content. Heh heh

Our Word Tree

wow

We've put all the red Reception words on the tree, apart from the three D couldn't remember. I've sat down at the puter to check a few emails - and there is something odd going on behind me.

D and T are standing on chairs next to our newly-adorned word tree. D is pointing to words, reading them to T and getting T to repeat them after her... I'm stunned. She read the entire tree for T to repeat, then gave her a big hug and an effusive "well done" when they'd finished. Now she's going through the Yr 1 words, spelling them out to T and asking me the occasional question.

Self-directed learning at its best. lol

Word tree

I've stolen this idea from someone - I think it's Jax. :) I've found all the KS1 words for Reception, Yrs 1 and 2, and have printed them all out onto a nifty little leaf template I made by scanning in an actual oak leaf and spending a fun ten minutes in Corel photo paint.

In Publisher I've done half a dozen leaf shapes to a page, put a nice big word in each in Comic Sans and am now printing them all out - Reception words on red, Yr 1&2 onto green.

And now I've finished playing, I've got the girls to help make a big paper tree, we've stuck in on the wall with a combination of sellotape and blu-tak (note to self - need more of both!).

So, if anyone wants some ready-to-print KS1 words... just shout. lol It's a big file, 20,000kb though. Gave Publisher a little indigestion the first time I asked it to print. But they actually look really good. Am well chuffed.

Quiet(er) day

Today was a quiet day in. We took the last remaining decorations down and packed them away in two boxes, which is quite an achievement when we started with four boxes worth and bought a ton more lights. I threw away a couple of boxes worth of old, broken, mismatched ornaments, tatty tinsel, duff lights, old ribbons and squashed bows. It was quite a relief to dump them and not feel obligated to put them on the tree, just because we had been handed them down from an aunt or Granny however many years ago.

D and T spent an hour or two watching inane stuff like Big Cook Little Cook, but then got bored and decended on the dining room demanding paper and pritt stick and scissors... Halfway through, they found a bag of those long skinny balloons you model things with in a box I was sorting, and so demanded dogs and giraffes to play with. I made them half a dozen (F was most impressed with hers!) and next thing I knew, D was at the ball of red wool with scissors and the dogs and giraffes were wearing collars, and harness and even had tufts of hair! A couple of regular balloons were adorned with hair and had faces drawn on them. All in all, a successful morning's arts and crafts, I think.

The girls had a nap, to make up for a series of late nights and broken sleep - the wind last night was a howling gale that woke them all up at some point - and I managed to sit down and actually read a book on Zen poetry I'd been wanting to look at in ages. How's that for amazing? I didn't spend the time frantically running around like a headless chicken trying to tidy up. The house has been tidy for three days now... does that tell you who really makes the mess round here? lol

And now, I'm catching up on email, blogging and drinking ginger tea, and feeling most calm and composed. Relaxed. DH is back tomorrow, so no doubt we'll be doing some serious talking, but for now, I'm enjoying the peace.

Garden day

Yes, before anyone grumbles, this post is backdated... but it's been a busy few days.

Yesterday we spent the entire morning in the garden. It was great. I've got some neat little 'splash suits' for the small ones, so everyone togged up in wellies and coats and gloves, and we dived headlong into the chaos that is my big back yard. With all the nonsense that's been going on round here for the past couple of months, both the garden and the allotment have been sadly neglected (no, I haven't been up the lottie since about early November and I'm dreading it).

I cleared up after the dog, then set to for some serious tidying. I didn't really get much chance to do proper gardening, as it took me till lunchtime just to pick up all the debris. Emptying dead hanging baskets, cleaning out the guinea pig, shifting half full bags of stuff I'd started collecting back in the autumn. In the end, I accumulated 4 big black bags full of rubbish, and filled one and a half bays in my big 3 bay composter thing.

Meanwhile, the girls attacked the potato bed with fork, hoe, sticks and hands and dug out all the little and slug-riddled spuds that we hadn't gotten around to eating before the frost hit. Need to dig that over and add a bit of lime ready for peas and beans. I have a deep raised bed that I grew a mish-mash of roots in last year - I think I'm going to do the same again this year. The soil was all fresh last spring, and I'm growing such a wide variety of stuf in there - carrots, beetroot, onions, marigolds, etc, that a second year of the same crops won't hurt. Where the purple popcorn was last year I think I'll put to potatoes, and then brassicas can go where the broad beans were. We'll see. I'm not even thinking of what is going where up at the lottie.

Today we all went on the bus.

Now I know there are a few of you who are probably raising eyebrows at this, but I am fortunate in that I've always had a car. Carting three small people around without a car is something I have thankfully never had to do. But, as DH has taken the truck with him this week, I have been carless. So we all piled on the bus that stops at the foot of my road and went on a 20 minute journey into Doncaster to spend the day with a friend, who's son D used to go to nursery with. The girls loved it - even F sat still for the best part of the journey.

And one advantage of going on the bus - when it was time to go home, the amount of whining , complaing and general grumbling was drastically reduced when I reminded D and T that we were going home on the bus. They practically ran out of the door. :)

I fed them, put them to bed, and then spent far too long on MSN chatting to various folks and friends dotted around the globe, and only realised the time when it was way gone 1am. So much for my quality me time and early nights, eh?

Yesterday's dirty day out

Oh did we have fun. :) As soon as I figure out how to post pictures on here, I'll be show casing our fab day out in the Dales.

5 vehicles met up at Woodall Services on the M1 southbound at 9.45 am (should have been 9.30, but we were late... ahem. Blame 3 small people.) Four Land Rover Discoverys and a 90 Defender. I'm actually writing this trip up for the Discovery Owners Club magazine, but I won't go into too much detail here. Call this a brief precis. lol

We headed to Bakewell and then spent the day following a trio of green lanes that took us north west from there onto a Roman road, right on the top of things - the 90 driver had a GPS system that informed us we were 1200ft above sea level. A fun, slippery, rocky staircase of a track brought us down onto a proper road by Ladybower Reservoir, just as the sun was setting. Midday we stopped in Tideswell for a snack and a hot drink.

I also found out the name Tideswell comes from a series of wells in the area that actually ebb and flow. Cool or what? I guess we could note that down as geography (geology? history?) :) Lots of natural history too, and food chains, ie, "Mom, what do sheep eat? Well what do cows eat? What do we call the bit of the cow we eat?" And subsequent lectures from D to T on "we eat sheep but it's called lamb, cow and it's called beef and pigs have lots of names like pork and bacon". T chimes in "me like chicken". D asks "Mom, what does chicken come from?"

Small pause.

"A farm?" quoth DH.

And on the subject of DH, I must now report that he has departed for Shropshire for 4 nights. Partially to fix up the old Range Rover we've had sat in a friend's field for over a year, and partially to give us a little space. Things were slightly strained over the festive period (hence lack of blogging!), and although the situation is much better now than back at the beginning of December (the words 'trial separation' were muttered at one point), we've decided to continue with the original plan that was decided upon before Yule. This way, he gets to chill out with an old friend, and some child-free thinking time. And, in a couple of weeks, I might get the chance to go away for a night or two on my own (maybe, if I'm very lucky).

So I now have 4 man-free days to start my mega-de-clutter for 2005. My mission this year? To make some space in this dinky house. The extension never happened last year (despite having planning permission granted back in the summer), so I've decided to make the most of what we do have, and dump all the extraneous clutter. Wish me luck! :)

The view from 1200 ft above sea level. I'm driving our truck - the one in the lead with all the lights on the roof!

Mud, glorious mud!

The five vehicles

Caught in the last rays of the days sun, at 1200ft above sea level

Hill decent at the end of the Roman road. (I'm in the 90 at the top of the slope)

My letter to LEA

Ok - not totally sure about the legalities/moralities of posting this letter here, but I thought I'd stick it up and ask for comments! After yesterday's meeting with Doncaster home-edders and the local EO contact, we've decided not to deal with our Inspector, one Mr Richard Eyebal (name changed to protect the innocent -well, spelling has been changed anyhow... lol), until he shows willing to acquaint himself with our methods, philosophies, etc and to at least show a glimmer of understanding as to why we do the things we do. To this end, I'm cancelling the visit that was arranged before Christmas. And, thanks to Ian Dowty and few 'suggestions', I have put together the following letter. Thanks to Jax too for her assistance in the matter. :) The letter is going to be sent out to Mr Eyebal, the Cheif Exec of the LEA and a couple of other people, probably the Mayor and a council bod or two, not that they are any use! lol

"With reference to Richard Eyebal’s letter dated xx December 2004, I must now cancel the arranged home visit of Mr Eyebal for 25th January 2005.

After discussion with numerous other home-educating families in the Doncaster area, it has been decided that we, as a group, will be declining all home visits from Mr Eyebal for the foreseeable future.

This is due to a number of reasons, the majority of which have been addressed in a letter addressed to you from Gary Podmore, the Education Otherwise contact for South Yorkshire. However, there are a number of more personal points that I wish to raise, arising from Mr Eyebal's last communication.

He stated that “The education provided has to be: ‘efficient, full time and suitable to the child’s age, abilities and aptitudes and to any special needs they may have’. Efficient means having purpose and moving forward; fulltime is fairly obvious but is defined as ‘similar in hours to school hours’ and suitable to the child’s abilities and aptitudes means appropriately demanding.”

The first part is a direct quote of law and is correct. However, the interpretation of it is incorrect, and appears to be a personal definition. ‘Efficient’, in this instance, has been defined by a Crown Court judge as “achieving that which it sets out to achieve”. This will be defined by a family’s educational philosophy. Similarly, ‘full-time’ is only definable within the parameters of the educational philosophy. If a family has chosen an autonomous route of education, then following school hours is counter-productive unless the child herself has chosen to adhere to a set timetable. Stating that ‘suitable’ means ‘appropriately demanding’ is a value judgement and this should not be given in the context of explaining the law.

He goes on to say “The role of the LEA is to see the evidence that persuades it that the child’s education is suitable and to take action if it is not in order to ensure that the child has a suitable education.”

Having spoken with a solicitor, this is not what S437 of the Education Act 1996 says at all. The LEA is allowed to make informal enquiries into the educational provision of the child. If, after making informal enquiries, the Inspector came to the conclusion that no “suitable education” was being provided, then he can require that suitable evidence be produced.

The next point he raises is “A home-educated child does not have to study the whole of the National Curriculum. However, she needs to have an education that opens up the future and does not foreclose it, so it is founded on a base of English, maths, science and ICT. After that, what is studied is the choice of the parent and child.”

This again is a value judgement and should not be stated as a fact of law. It is very prescriptive and does not take into account the educational philosophy of a family. Some families may have religious or philosophical grounds to object to these ‘core subjects’, such as a desire to teach creationism as opposed to a more Darwinistic point of view. There are also families that do not use computers.

In my previous letter, I had informed Mr Eyebal that my daughter was still in the de-schooling process. To this he responded “I find the concept of de-schooling a little curious and usually rather ill-defined.”

There has been a great deal written about de-schooling in the past few years, as more and more children are removed from school for a variety of reasons. If Mr Eyebal finds the process ill-defined, he obviously hasn’t done much in the way of research into the subject. Education Otherwise would be the best place to obtain references from to satisfy his curiosity. To quote from “Deschooling, Unschooling and Natural Learning” by Beverley Paine (1999): "Deschooling specifically refers to that period of adjustment experienced by children removed from school settings. It also can include the process of deschooling parents; that is, the unlearning of concepts and beliefs about the nature and purpose of education. School based methods of instruction and thinking rarely translate directly into the homeschool. […] It often takes many months, and sometimes even a year, for the process of deschooling to unfold.”

There are numerous other points in Mr Eyebal’s letter but as these are more of a subjective nature and do not relate directly to educational law, I shall let them pass. His tone, however, leaves a great deal to be desired, and more than one person who I have solicited help from has commented on its threatening nature.

In order to fulfil our legal obligation, we will be providing the LEA with an educational philosophy, a report on our methods of applying it and a précis of what educational work is being done. This will mainly be in the form of a diary, as, although we hope to have some written work to include, we are not pushing D to produce written material at present."

So - any suggestions? Add more, take some away? I haven't mailed it yet - will wait until Friday so I can get as much feedback as I can.

Off for a run now - will tell all about today's dirty day out later! lol

Long time no blog

Just a quick hello - to say we are still here and I'll be updating the blog shortly...

So much has happened in the past month, I hardly know where to start. However, now is not the time, as it's late and we've got a day's green laning in the Peak District tomorrow. :) I hope it's nice and muddy.

We had the Doncaster Eyebal meeting today at Lesley's house. Seems like we're all agreed on giving Mr Eyebal the cold shoulder until he agrees to at least listen to us. We're not asking for total agreement with the way we each do our individual things, but a glimmer of understanding would be appreciated.

I'll put up my own letter to him tomorrow at some point. For now, I need some sleep.