"Although I speak from my own experience, I feel that no one has the right to impose his or her beliefs on another person. I will not propose to you that my way is best. The decision is up to you. If you find some point which may be suitable for you, then you can carry out experiments for yourself. If you find that it is off no use, then you can discard it." Dalai Lama...

Sunday 13 January 2008

Letter awareness,reading and Cherry picking from unschooling sites!!

Milly has been seeing the shape of letters everywhere.
Now she has known her letters for many years ,having learnt them at school but over the last few weeks she has been seeing letter shapes in all sorts of places, the way a particular item is set out or a peice of string left on the table etc. Yesterday we were sitting in the living room discussing what to do with the day ( Emily had not gone to gymnastics and it is most likely she will not go back I realised after yet another morning where she didn't want to go that I had to allow her the choice and she was so happy, I feel I had pushed to encourage her when I should of let go a lot sooner,another lesson learnt.) and as we were talking she said "thats a w " and showed us the shape her legs had made so this led on to all of us making the alphabet together, what fun rolling about on the floor making the shapes. I am not sure what is going on for her but it seems she is making links in her own way and a clearer understanding of the shapes seems to be unfolding.
Alongside this she has been reading more by herself. She had stashed a load of her favourite books between her matteress and our bed and put the torch there and has been reading after I have left her as she informed me the other day!! She has also said she will read for ten mins to Al each night so she chose to look through a lovely book by Kate Petty and Jennie Maizels called The wonderful world book, it has lots of pop ups and facts and then Al started reading Phillip Pulman The Northern Lights, We generally have a book that Milly and I read and her and Al have one they read together.
Her use of language has continued to improve and I love it when she tries out a new word and a couple of days a go she went into the kitchen and on seeing two boiled eggs I had left on a plate set on top of a mixing bowl to cool called back "those eggs are a bit precarious" and proceeded to move them to a safer position. And yesterday she sat watching tv whilst she had her sausage sarni for breakfast and afterwards brought her plate through and said "that was a delightful breakfast"
I was thinking yesterday that I have looked at many different websites/blogs over the last year and some have been useful in that they have allowed me to see that is not a direction we would or could go in as it just wouldn't work for us and others have had much more a feel of what it is we are searching for but not everyhting they do is right for us either, it really has been like shopping and finding things that fit us out of all the interesting and varied shops.And in some cases as our experience has grown and we have a firmer idea what it is we want we are actually designing and making things that fit us.One day soon we will have our complete package that will be able to be adapted as time moves on and things change.

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