28/01/2014: Chinese New Year

Chinese style painting

The sun was shining brightly this morning as we started our latest meeting in Okeford Fitzpaine. We were a little light on the toy front but had lots of other activities to enjoy.

14/01/2014 New beginnings

New hall © E Weeks

This was our first time in our new hall. It was slightly intimidating walking into that large space not really sure where to put everything. But we quickly settled in, got the toys out and muddled our way through the session.

Tuesday 14th January: Resource Share

Do you have a home education book that you love? A preferred brand for workbooks? Or even an all in one curriculum? If so please bring them to our next meeting on Tuesday 14th January 2014 so that we can all have a browse over the many resources that are available to home educators. Whether it's learn to read booklets or a set of cuisenaire rods we would love to see them.

One issue with home education can be sourcing products or simply not knowing where to start when there are so many options available. Purchasing items on line can sometimes make for expensive mistakes. This is an opportunity to share our favourite, or perhaps worst, items.

With a new hall and lots of new ideas being generated for the next term I am expecting the our first meeting to be a little disorganised but hopefully we'll have fun with the chaos.

The session starts from 10am, I hope to see you there!

New Year, New Hall

Our new location, Okeford Fitzpaine village hall.

I hope that you have had lots of fun throughout the festive season. Now that we're in the new year I'm finding that I'm itching get on with lots of new projects.

10/12/2013 Christmas fun

Icing biscuits

The favourite activity today was clearly biscuit decorating, the table was packed with children anxious to decorate a biscuit before they were all gone.

Guardian News Article: Children taught at home learn more

Children taught at home significantly outperform their contemporaries who go to school, the first comparative study has found.

It discovered that home-educated children of working-class parents achieved considerably higher marks in tests than the children of professional, middle-class parents and that gender differences in exam results disappear among home-taught children.

Read the full article here .

26/11/2013 Advent and Picasso

Hama beads

We had a busy day today, four different crafts and lots of free play. A few of the children took advantage of the Hama beads to have some quiet, focused time.

12/11/2013: Cress heads and peg weaving



Two activities today! Cress heads, made from Sawdust with cress seeds sprinkled in the bottom (or top depending on child). These need to be kept damp, I'm looking forward to seeing their hair sprouting over the next week or two. 

22/10/2013 Autumn leaves

The activity this week was inspired by The Artful Parent, drawing on leaves with metallic pens. They look great! Another similar idea is to get out your paints as seen here on Geninne's Art Blog.

08/10/2013 Harvest bread

Wheat sheaf

As a nod towards the seasonal harvest festivities we created a wheat sheaf loaf. All of the children helped to put this together including the all important mouse at the bottom. Here is a quick youtube video on how to do this, we used scissors to shape the ears of wheat.

Rolls

Individual rolls were also made to take home.