Another year of home ed plans

I’ve had a few messages recently asking about what home ed looks like for us, what ‘lessons’ we do etc, so I thought I’d do a little update on where we are at.

I have three home full time still – Baya is 13 and would be Year 9, Beastie is 7 and would be Year 3, and Oren is 3 and I guess could be in nursery!

We’re working on the plan at the moment, that this will be Baya’s last year home full-time, she’s hoping to join a 14-16 programme at a local college next year. So we’re focusing on going skills that will benefit her next year in college. She’ll study for an NVQ alongside Maths and English GCSEs. We’re spending some time brushing up her maths and English skills, filling in any gaps in her knowledge and going back over things she’s done before. Lots of practice at essay writing too, though we’ve been looking at https://en.ibuyessay.com/statistics.html as it has been recommended to us. She’s taking a Maths and English Class through the £2 pound tuition hub.

She’s using a couple of sites to back up these lessons – some grammar lessons on the BBC, Bitesize Maths as well as the Khan Academy for some extra maths backup. She’s doing lots of reading, and using Oak Academy for some creative writing challenges.

She’s also studying Biology using Oakabooks and Continuity Oak, as well as using Oakabooks and Oak Academy for some History and Geography.

That all sounds more formal than it is in reality. I don’t expect her to spend hours every day sat down studying. We usually have one or two days a week at home when she’ll do a few hours study, but the rest of the week she’ll do a little work before we go out or after we get home. Occasionally she’ll take her laptop with her to a home ed group, and sit and work whilst the boys play.

Beastie at 7, I don’t expect him to do lots of sit-down work. I think kids learn SO much just through living life, especially at this age. One of the big reasons that I didn’t send the children to school is I think they shouldn’t be sat down at desks all day so young.

That said, we don’t do ‘nothing’ either. He’s been using the Reading Eggs and Mathsfactor programmes for several years. He’s still using Reading Eggs, but we’ve just switched to The Maths Factor for maths. He’s really enjoying the programme, and it’s pushing his maths skills – he’s actually really good with numbers so I wanted more of a challenge for him.

We’re also doing a project each term – first off, we’re looking at Roman Britain. I love projects as they can incorporate so much – history, geography, maths, English skills… We’ll be studying at home, using the internet, books from the library, printables from Twinkl as well as taking some field trips. We’ve had a walk around Roman Chester, we also have a Roman Workshop at a museum coming up and will visit a couple of other museums and Roman sites too.

He’s also studying for an Arts Award through HomeEducated.org.

Remember – all of this only makes up a tiny fraction of their education. Education happens all the time, not only when they’re sitting doing a lesson, worksheets or something that ‘looks’ like learning.

We bake together, play games, build with our Lego, craft, TALK, watch documentaries, meet up with friends, visit the Zoo, museums, National Trust Properties, woods, etc

Life is where real learning happens.

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