Home is Where the Heart is-Kei Te Kainga Te Ngakau - Homeschool Blogger

An interesting year to date...

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 06:47:00 -0500

...The Sydney weather has been crazy this year, but today was a typical, spring day, warm, sunny, and a great day at the Sutherland Leisure center. We are now at Sutherland for art ever second week on a Friday, and then to the pools afterwards, a brilliant way to spend a Friday!

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ELise's end of year exam project: Choosing the right dog, how to look after a dog, what they eat, calculate the cost of owning a dog-flea, worming, vet bills, grooming, food!! etc. Basically everything you need to know about owning a dog.

Science unit for the term (Elise): Population Dynamics, sounds impressive doesn't it! It is a unit I got from a google search for year 6 science projects/lessons, from the Public Schools of North Carolina website [www.ncpublicschools.org]

Major Goals and Learning Outcomes:

Why is the interaction of an organism essential for its survival?
What abiotic factors affect growth and survival of organisms?
How does habitat destruction affect biodiversity?
What is pollution?
How does human activity impact the environment?
What steps can humans take to reduce their impact on the environment? Why has human population increased?
What effect does increased population have?
What is natural selection and how does it work?
What is adaptation?
What evidence is there for change over time?

Its actually just an extension of what we have been doing about all year, environmental change, habitats, how our actions affect the environment etc. It is a great wrap up for an end of year unit.

Our main learning will be making a terrarium, for a turtle, she is currently in the process of making a list of all the requirements, while Im looking for a really big glass container or fishtank/terrarium. She has to find out and get everything the turtle will need in a balance ecosystem.

The little kiddies are doing, an excel workbook, living and non living at the moment. But we are also working in line with Eli'ses unit, by finding out what a bean plant needs to grow, recycling and not wasting resources. Not any/much book work, mainly oral, but there are a few sites on the internet that they go on, and we do alot of hands on, nature study, recycling, timing showers, talking about news articles.

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Had a trial for 14 days with Reading Eggs, the kids loved it, I assessed Tamerah's reading using their online test, but I got her to start only a couple of levels from the beginning as I didn't want her to miss the fun of getting to the higher levels. Will be purchasing it for the year for both, but only Gil Gway will carry on as I think Tamerah will be pass this stage by years end. Quite good because it has the readers oline, they can make a little avatar and it has a little house! [Reading Eggs]

The two little kids have finished their maths for the year, will just let them play around on the Matheletics, play lots of hands on games and just general everyday activities for maths.

Elise is still carrying on but she'll be finished also, hopefully in a couple of weeks so we can concertrate on our projects. All in all we've had a good maths year, learnt new concepts, did some great assessments, had a good time.

A little song from the Homeschool Freebie of the Day site

Fri, 7 Aug 2009 00:20:00 -0500

Another Computer Crash...

Sat, 23 May 2009 06:43:00 -0500

...Fortunately, I have learnt from previous crashes and backed up regularily, unfortunately, I forgot to back up our photos thinking they were in Documents, they were NOT!!

But the computer is going, I have remembered nearly all my passwords, almost everything that is important is on the external harddrive, life is good! I am once again connected to the W.W.W.

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We started of well this year, as you can tell by no entries, too busy doing other stuff lol. Had a good first term organised to a ''t'', didn't do everything, but, were able to stay on track and know where we were up to.

This second term the girls have started Rangers, (went with a friend from HSchool classes), a church based adventure group, sort of like guides and scouts, they love it! There is a world Rangers camp next year in January, in Queensland, which we are keen to go to, but we'll see. MaHoney wont get the time off, so don't know if I want to go by myself.

Lisey is playing netball this term too, it is on grass courts, which I thought would be easier on her ankle she hurt last year. She is playing with the same friend from Rangers, and is really enjoying it. I think the less competitive nature from last years comp, is doing alot for her confidence, and her defence has come along in leaps and bounds.

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I seem to be in a constant round of starting again in this blog, going in circles. I am hoping, nigh Praying!! that this will be the last time for a long time that I have to change my computer. good nite world

Another Year, another dollar...

Wed, 21 Jan 2009 08:56:00 -0600

...Oh sorry wrong blog!
As is usual for the beginnning of the school year (Australia), I am busy preparing 'stuff' for the year ahead. I also have daughter number two to register, but Im not too worried about this.

I decided to use quarter planners for this years daily work, I think this works quite well whether your using a set curriculum, have chosen your own work/books, or just to plan trips etc you want done each term.

I have a list of goals, trips and books/curriculum I want to cover for each subject and a planner page of eleven weeks with 5 days in each, I originally used the quarter planner on Donna Young.org but this is only a nine week planner, so I just used the same format and added two rows.

For Term One Language Arts for Merah Moo, I did the following:

Subject: English 2009

Name: Term:One

Key: FIAR = Five in a row, Son = Sonlight PK, W = Week

Week

Starting

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

27.1

Homeschool Preparation Week

2.2

FIAR Glorious Flight

Son W16

Copywork Review a-c

Reading review

FIAR Glorious Flight

Son W16

Copywork review d-g

Reading review

FIAR Glorious Flight

Son W16

Letter H + copywork

Reading review

FIAR Glorious Flight

Son W16

Letter H + copywork

Reading review

FIAR Glorious Flight

Son W16

Letter H + copywork

Reading review

9.2

FIAR Apple Pie

Son W17

Letter I + Copywork

Reading new sound k

FIAR Apple Pie

Son W17

Letter I + Copywork

Reading new sound k

FIAR Apple Pie

Son W17

Letter I + Copywork

Reading new sound k

FIAR Apple Pie

Son W17

Letter I + Copywork

Reading new sound k

FIAR Apple Pie

Son W17

Test/Review week and previous learning

16.2

FIAR Ping

Son W18

Letter J + Copywork

Reading new sound l

FIAR Ping

Son W18

Letter J + Copywork

Reading new sound l

FIAR Ping

Son W18

Letter J + Copywork

Reading new sound l

FIAR Ping

Son W18

Letter J + Copywork

Reading new sound l

FIAR Ping

Son W18

Test/Review week and previous learning

23.2

FIAR Lentil

Son W19

Letter K + Copywork

Reading new sound p

FIAR Lentil

Son W19

Letter K + Copywork

Reading new sound p

FIAR Lentil

Son W19

Letter K + Copywork

Reading new sound p

FIAR Lentil

Son W19

Letter K + Copywork

Reading new sound p

FIAR Lentil

Son W19

Test/Review week and previous learning

2.3

FIAR Clown of God

Son W20

Letter L+ Copywork

Reading new sound u

FIAR Clown of God

Son W20

Letter L+ Copywork

Reading new sound u

FIAR Clown of God

Son W20

Letter L+ Copywork

Reading new sound u

FIAR Clown of God

Son W20

Letter L+ Copywork

Reading new sound u

FIAR Clown of God

Son W 20

Test/Review week and previous learning

9.3

FIAR Mike Mulligan

Son W21

Letter M+ Copywork

Reading new sound x

FIAR Mike Mulligan

Son W21

Letter M+ Copywork

Reading new sound x

FIAR Mike Mulligan

Son W21

Letter M+ Copywork

Reading new sound x

FIAR Mike Mulligan

Son W21

Letter M+ Copywork

Reading new sound x

FIAR Mike Mulligan

Son W 21

Test/Review week and previous learning

16.3

FIAR Robert Frost

Son W22

Letter N + Copywork

Reading new sound v

FIAR Robert Frost

Son W22

Letter N + Copywork

Reading new sound v

FIAR Robert Frost

Son W22

Letter N + Copywork

Reading new sound v

FIAR Robert Frost

Son W22

Letter N + Copywork

Reading new sound v

FIAR Robert Frost

Son W 22

Test/Review week and previous learning

23.3

Son W23

Letter O+ Copywork

Reading new sound w

Son W23

Letter O+ Copywork

Reading new sound w

Son W23

Letter O+ Copywork

Reading new sound w

Son W23

Letter O+ Copywork

Reading new sound w

Son W 23

Test/Review week and previous learning

30.3

Son W24

Letter P+ Copywork

Reading new sound y,z

Son W24

Letter P+ Copywork

Reading new sound y,z

Son W24

Letter P+ Copywork

Reading new sound y,z

Son W24

Letter P+ Copywork

Reading new sound y,z

Son W 24

Test/Review week and previous learning

6.4

Son W25

Letter Qu + Copywork

Reading new sound qu

Son W25

Letter Qu + Copywork

Reading new sound qu

Son W25

Letter Qu + Copywork

Reading new sound qu

Son W25

Letter Qu + Copywork

Reading new sound qu

Son W 24

Test/Review week and previous learning

Seems alot of prep and sometimes I don't end up doing anything that is on the timetable, but for me I need to see where I am going in order to get there. Nothing we are doing is set in stone, it is just a guideline for me.

I haven't tried being this 'organised' before, I usually prepare work weekly, and it sure is alot of work, but I think to do the work now before the year begins saves me alot of heart ache later, like not preparing the weekend before and thus not doing hardly any work for a week!!! Plus we have a big year and organising our time is going to pay of in the long run.

I have Goals for each subject for the year, chosen books or other sources of info, and broken in down into weekly bits, As I use alot of American type curriculum that uses 35 week time table I'd just use the remaining 5 weeks through the year to catch up, extra projects etc.

After the quarter planners are filled out I transfer the work required for the term to a checklist (also available on Donna Young.org ) the checklist is just a list of work that needs to be completed daily/weekly etc., ie. handwriting, spelling, reading, math workbook, bible narration etc. and you put a little tick each day that you do your work. It is handy in that you don't have to keep turning pages back and forth minute of the day to see what you have to cover! Thanks Donna.

Well getting back to work.

Drama club and Dance recital.......

Fri, 5 Dec 2008 22:03:00 -0600

....The dance recital was awesome last night! We saw the junior drama club's performance first, Dragon in the Mix, the kids were great! I think the oldest was about 8 but they knew most of their lines and it was even funny!! Tamerah was on the edge of her seat, she knew quite a few of the actors performing, so she was clapping throughout.

'Merah performed after intermission and before the intermediate performance of the Wizard of Oz. She was a bit nervous so forgot some actions but she has great rhythm and looked like she was having fun!! When she got of the stage she was ecstatic she couldn't stop talking about it.

She rang her nana when she got home and talked and talked about what happened. We took a video on Ma honey's cellphone so we'll show her when we get over to NZ.

Will definitely carry on dance next year!!

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Next years classes for term one:

Monday:                 Gymnastics                     Tamerah
Tuesday:
Wednesday:            Art                                 Elise
Thursday:               Drama/Singing                Elise and Tamerah
Friday                     Dance                             Elise and Tamerah

GilGway wont do any classes till term three, or mabey dance term one we'll see.

Also may try to do some instruments we'll see how the finances go and time I suppose!!

End of year Recitals....

Thu, 4 Dec 2008 04:19:00 -0600

...and other end of year excursions.

Another year another dollar (spent lol), we are currently in the middle of dance rehearsals, and singing practices, all very exciting, luckily, mabey a phenomenom in homeschool circles?? we didn't really have to spend too much, in fact for the dance the teacher, even suggested a secondhand shop to puruse for costume ideas, and the $2 for sequins and so forth, so me being me, I went all out, so Merah Moos top and skirt are all sequined till they can hold no more!! Not really, I think I got just the right amount not over the top!!

She is now wearing black legwarmers over white tights, and black and white striped socks instead of the white legwarmers, so she looks pretty funky, the theme was just black and white, so everyone was able to put in their little bit of creativity. She is also in make up, something about the lights making you green when you perform???! anyway, she just loves it haha. Im trying to upload a video to UTube but its taking an awful long time so when it does I'll paste a link here, its from her dress rehersal at the auditorium today.

Speaking of today, dropped one daughter of at singing about 15 mins before it started, then took of to the other side of town for the dance rehearsal, dont need a crystal ball to see where its all going now haha. Just have my son to turn 5 now and I'll need a time machine to get me to the various appointments on time, I'll definitely need to find a good takeaway coffee shop to keep me going lol!

Lisey and Merah have their singing performance next Thursday, its just part of the normal practice, so not at night. They are dressing in red or green top with jeans and a Christmas hat of some kind. Now that Merah has gotten a taste of performing in front of people, I think she will be glad to sing next week!! She's come a long way since I took her to her first ballet class, but I guess thats what a few years can do to a person!

Lisey is enjoying performing also, she is more confident, and likes getting to interact with other kids, I do want to get her into dance next year, it might not be what she likes, she'd prefer hip hop or something similar, but it will cover the curriculum for dance and performance., I'll try her in the first term and see how we go.

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Lisey and I are getting into handmade bags, we did a jean bag with an old pair of her jeans:, she didn't sew much of it, but she did sew on the sequins. She is going to learn somemore sewing, might see if we can make some rag dolls and sell them, something where my daughters can be creative and also learn economics at the same time. Heres the jean bag:

And this is my flower power bag, just going to use it for knitting or similar:

Its a cord type material with a velveteen liining:

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have to cut the post short, way past my bedtime, but next time I have some good oneliners that my kids have come up with, tune in then!!

Swimming and other curriculum...

Sun, 26 Oct 2008 22:52:00 -0500

...Haha, we are definitely doing alot of Physical Education this term, specifically swimming, beside the fact that it is good therapy for 'Lisey's' newly decasted leg!! It has been getting pretty hot here in Sydney. Plus the younger two aren't really into swimming, so teaching them is definitely good for the portfolio!!

We bought several different types of floaties to help the kids to gain confidence in the water. "Merah likes the swim shirt with the floaties sewn in,

And Gil Gway, prefers the swim vest with the noodles!

The younger two after much coaxing and bribing, got into the pool and we could barely get them out! So now I am able to get into the pool and actually have a swim around instead of holding a cold, wet baby.

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I have been very pleased with the amount of work we have done this week, and what we have achieved (Im talking about how much I've got done!!). It seems like a couple of hours have been added to the day, and I haven't run out of time. Surprisingly, we've managed to do all subjects, learn our Latin each day, do the Trail Guide to World Geography each day and extra, even do some science bookwork!!

I do have a couple of things I still want to work on, I need to get "Lisey writing more and doing a better job of composing, she is still very basic in how she writes a story, and I thought she would be along a bit more by now. We are using Writing Strands or rather just started, and she just follows the instructions for that days lesson, by herself and I check it afterwards. By the end of the last book, she should be able to write University papers, so I thought that was a great goal to aim for!!

I do want to increase Tamerah's work load, we are slowly working though the sounds using the 100 easy lessons, and increasing her reading work, I make up little books on the computer with the words we are currently reading, so as she is not trying to learn too many different words all at once, which I found when I tried to use a bought reading curriculum. I am happy with the amount of reading she is doing, and I try not to compare it to what I know the kids in school at her age are learning, but its a bit hard!!

Registration again...

Wed, 4 Feb 2009 07:55:00 -0600

...once again I have to look at registering one of my children, the second one this time, have a basic programme but need to refine and finish of the sections. I'll have to have a home inspection at the same time, seeing as we've moved about 4 times since February last year!!

My main problem with this year is that it has been so disjointed, moving everywhere, taking trips back to New Zealand. I haven't been recording results and evaluations as much as I would have liked. But I do know we have covered the work I wanted to and so much more!

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Well above was written last September, and today we just had the NSWbos 'inspector'?? over, she was happy to give a 2 year registration, but since Elise is due for another inspection in December, we are lining them up together, so I will have two to do at years end, lucky me.

I had a few doubts this year, because I felt like I had just fluked my way through 'Merah's registration, like I hadn't tried hard enough. But I think I might just be beginning to know what Im doing!!! Yay for me lol!! The inspector did say I'd get more confident, which is great.

Anyway I know Ive got my groove now, I definitely need the more organised program route, rather than the hit and miss', and chuck a bit of this in for luck' approach Ive been know to use haha! Alot more work, but it gets the job done, and I actually use my timetables etc. I still have to fine tune, and we do get side tracked, but we are enjoying life and getting the work done at the same time.

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We started family 'fun' run tonight, when my Honey got home after work. Sammy made us all get into our sneakers (joggers, runners), put the kids bikes in the back of the ute and ferried us to the bike track near us. I had to RUN, well, run and walk, mainly walk haha!, around the track and the kiddies got to bike, it actually took only about 10-15 mins, but I haven't had that much experience lately, in the blood, sweat and tears, area! I came straight home, showered, and got into pjs, while everyone else went for a swim.

The kiddies loved it, I tried to love it, and seeing as we are going tomorrow etc, etc, etc, I'd better make my peace with the process now haha!

That's all for now, nite all!

So what have we been doing??

Sat, 27 Sep 2008 09:02:00 -0500

...well homeschooling, obviously!! Not enough time to update the blog unfortunately. Lots of going out to classes, probably too many.

In the last couple of weeks however, I was looking forward to a, believe it or not, a school reunion! 20+ years I think since I last went to this school, I left when I was about 12 but Ive been 'talking' on facebook to some old friends and was going to go.

Unfortunately, Lisey fractured her lower leg at the homeschool gymnastics class last Monday, we spent the night in hospital with a backslab on and she had a small procedure the next morning, the surgeon took her to theatre to push the protruding bone back in, it was only about 5mm out, but he wanted to be sure it healed properly, which was jolly decent of him!! They also put her full cast on while she was out, handy seeing as it would have hurt alot!!! She has a high pain threshold as she barely made a sound when the nurse and I were putting on the backslab, but Im glad she didn't have to feel them pushing the bone back in.

I've decided that she will NOT be doing gymnastics for the rest of the year, mabey not ever. In fact I think my kids should not play any sport and theyll major in chess and tiddlywinks! Although Im having second thoughts about tiddlywinks, thumb fatigue!? haha!

On the serious side, I am a bit scared, we all try and keep our kids safe, sometimes I try too hard, but ironically, even then my poor baby has managed to have three breaks in 10 years of life. Her right arm just before she turned one, her right arm again when she fell of the trampoline at her friends place and her leg. Makes a mother literally want to wrap their child in cotton wool. She gets it off in four weeks and then I'll start rehabilitation, I think we'll do aqua aerobics, and do some walking etc for the rest of the year. Just some gentle excercise. Still deciding whether to let 'Merah moo do gymnastics for the last term, may skip it.

On a high note however, my mum did come over to help me with 'Lisey which is great, the kids are loving it!

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Our other unheaval we've had is we found out Ma honey's nana had lung cancer just this week, she's had it for a while apparenly, she passed away today so everyone has flown back home for the tangi, Im definitely rethinking life! We spent all our time in another country, and only go back when our family dies, I don't think I want to do this anymore.

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Creative Arts

'Lisey and Merah have been knitting, Merah gets frustrated with it so we have to work a bit more with her, shes making a bag, 'Lisey is doing well, she knitted a small bag for her ipod, I didn't think the wool was stable enough for a bag so I suggested we felt the bag and handle. It turned out well, neither of us have felted before so it was cool. 'Lisey gave it to her nana for her mp3 player when she came over. Lisey wrote a 'how to' sheet to explain how to make it, I think her writing still needs alot to work, as well as her handwriting.

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Science

We've also got some pets, well not yet, I bought some sea monkeys for the kids, Ive always wanted sea monkeys since reading the Archie comics and Richie Rich comics when I was a kiddy. We have started them, but they are microscopic almost! supposed to be about 13mm long once they are grown, won't post any pictures until we can acutally see something!

We are also doing the solar system again, we got a pack from the craft store, of polystyrene orbs, haha, in approximate sizes of the planets. Need to get some wire for the mobile, the children painted them with their uncle. We are using Space by readers digest pathfinders, and getting the magic school bus video about outer space. The kids love the magic school bus, I think they learn alot from the series. I want to get Lisey to write a description about each planet.

Ive finally learnt how to put in links!!

Mon, 25 Aug 2008 08:26:00 -0500

Check it out under 'Resources' in the right hand side column, under my counter!! I'm stoked lol. This HTML stuff is confusing, luckily someone else helped and voila! I just added a new one tonight the Erkstine Family's HomeschoolFreebieOfTheDay.com

Now that Im talking about the Right hand side of my blog, I'll just let you know about a couple of things I have listed there. The Favourite Resources, online bookshop, online ebook shop, and Homeschool Information pages, are all either online shops, or free resource pages, which I have used personally, and can recommend each and every entry there. If you want to know any extra information about any of these sites, just let me know.

Have a great night world