A LIFE WORTH LIVING....: Animal antics

Saturday 5 January 2008

Animal antics

Today started with a good lie in for me as Alan got up to walk Beauty.
Emily woke up around 9 and crept downstairs thinking I was fast asleep,bless her she is so thoughtful.As it was I was deep in thought only with my eyes closed.
I have been thinking so much about alternative parenting my head is in a spin, we are having some challenging times at present,I think tiredness and excitement are still the main players (although Emily has been choosing to go to bed earlier lately) but it suddenly dawned on me yesterday that hormonal changes could also be playing a part in the behaviour.That came as a bit of a shock, if that is in fact what is happening it seems too soon!!! Need to gather some info for her...
Anyhow my mind has been working overtime trying to think of ways to stop falling into the same way of coping as in the past which has usually been to end up coercing her into the kind of behaviour I want.I have no answers as yet and feel added pressure because I am not at my most patient at present as the PMT I have been going through since well before Xmas is still going on, overdue by 3 weeks now ( not pregnant just Menopause) and I am feeling crap...

The rest of today has been spent getting the decs and tree down and having a good clean up,we have to finish off tomorrow because we broke off to go into town and Emily went to my sisters and for a drive up the fells to find some snow, most of it had gone unfortunately apart from two large snowmen that had been built so they were able to play with that and had a good snowball fight, built another one out of them and went in the stream and built dams...

We had lunch in town and exchanged the things from Xmas that didn't fit etc and then went onto the library,since watching The Golden Compass Emily has a daemon and it changes frequently but is often a Snow leopard and an otter,Emily and Alan watched a lovely documentary about snow leopards on TV last night and I had hoped to get a story about a snow leopard but was out of luck, although we managed to find a nice little book with easily digestible facts about otters and have requested Tarka the otter to read so it should be delivered to our local library next week.I may read it first to assess the ending as I have not read it and know it is sad but we have read a few books with sad endings and although we have had a good cry she has coped well .
I will get some other info off the PC about both and make up some word searches and crosswords to do if she wants to.I have found that when she is into a subject this can be a way to reinforce some of the facts in a way she enjoys doing and doesn't see as teaching.It is also possible that alongside the drawings we will do a story together with her words and me writing.

We have a very old book my mum gave to one of my cousins 1970 about animals of the wild and their young and she has always loved looking through it with us .These last few days she has spent along time looking through and asking for snippets to be read out about various animals . Tonight after a very busy day I could of done with a little time to chill but after trying to get to sleep she came back down and has been drawing from the book and chatting non stop about the animals,I know ,I know that's one of the great things about unschooling they can learn anytime!!!

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This is me.....

There comes a time when you have to stand up and shout: This is me damn it! I look the way I look, think the way I think, feel the way I feel, love the way I love! I am a whole complex package. Take me... or leave me. Accept me - or walk away! Do not try to make me feel like less of a person, just because I don't fit your idea of who I should be and don't try to change me to fit your mold. If I need to change, I alone will make that decision.When you are strong enough to love yourself 100%, good and bad - you will be amazed at the opportunities that life presents you.” Stacey Charter.

Why we Home educate

( Slightly edited from a blog post I did when we started out) In the end the actual decision to take Emily out only took a matter of days but before that it had been around a year and a half of talking about ti and reading books, Free range education by Terri Dowty, Educating your child at home by Jane Lowe and Alan Thomas were two that had a real impact for different reasons. Free range education has lots of examples of real life home educators and I think I can say that it was this one that convinced me the most that we could do it. We are two very average people ,neither of us left school with many qualifications, we went on to do quite well in our chosen professions and had no need to think about the education system at all until Emily came along.

I knew about home education and when Emily was born considered it as an optionbut always felt my lack of education would be a problem and that I wouldn't be capable of providing her with what she would need.Looking back with hindsight it is easy to see how wrong I was!!

School never really suited Emily......After the nursery year at a very highly rated, high achieving school we knew that particular School wasn't for us and took her out. We enrolled her in a lovely village school with only 70 children in the whole school .The ethos of the school was totally different, the children didn't wear uniforms and there was much more emphasis on the children being individuals.The head was a sensitive and principled man who wanted the best for the children. We thought we had struck gold.Over the reception and year 1 Emily gained confidence and really started to bloom. It was at this time she was diagnosed with dyspraxia( we had had to go down the diagnosis route as our observations of Emily's difficulties were not enough to enable the teachers to tailor things so she was helped and given less work in class) but she managed quite well in the more relaxed play orientated early years.Year 2 with more emphasis on academic activities got progressively harder for her. She is very sensitive and it wasn't just the academic side it was the embarassment of having to put her hand up for the toilet,seeing others being told off and worrying in case she did something wrong and got the same treatment, panicking because she couldn't do the work and the teacher never had time to sit with her (alot of this did not come out until she had left school) her behaviour at home became worse and worse she was so angry and obviously stressed . At this time we began to seriously consider taking her out but held back because of my lack of confidence in my ability to provide her with an adequate education ,my health being so poor was also a major stumbling block.

Then in year three it became blatantly obvious that something needed to change .She was struggling on all levels and we couldn't allow the school system to damage our daughter anymore.She became ill with a bug that was doing the rounds and she was off for two weeks , during that time I had a conversation with a friend who home educates her two children and I was so upset I couldn't make a decision and she said just go with whats in your heart and that really helped me to shift my thinking and stop worrying about what I couldn't give her and focus on what I could give her.

We never sent her back.I still get emotional when I think of that time , the look on Emily's face when we told her she would never have to go back to school was priceless,the immense sense of relief that we were off the treadmill of school life and the excitement of the time ahead and to be honest the fear of the unknown......

So here we are four years on and a lot of reading and researching later I feel comfortable with what we are doing . The changes that have happened so far have been helped along the way by the many wonderful blogs out there.They are so varied and there are so many different approaches , I have found ones that I can identify with and have read a lot of archive material that has been written in each and found answers to so many of the questions I have had that they have helped me to sort out what will work best for us .As much as I wish we had done this earlier and saved Emily from the distress that she went through I do believe things happen for a reason and that the time was right for us to take her out and that looking on the bright side one of the benefits is that at least she has had a taste of school and now we all know without a doubt that it is not for us !!!!

It is very liberating to be making decisions based on what works best for us as a family and not what society expects.

Let your child be a child.

No child was ever spoiled by too much love.

Be authentic with your child.

Listen openly to your child’s needs.

Believe in your child’s good intentions.

Find the humour.

Look past the behaviour… what is your child feeling?

Have fun with your child today!

“There is no reason why we cannot say ‘No’ to children in just as kind a way as we say ‘Yes’.” - John Holt

“Play is really the work of childhood.” - Fred Rogers

“The best way to make children good is to make them happy.” - Oscar Wilde

Children thrive in a peaceful and loving environment.

A child needs love most when things go wrong.

Children reflect the treatment they receive.

A few qoutes I like....

Life shouldn't be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in, broadside, thouroughly used up, totally worn out and loudly shouting, 'WOW'.... Beth Moore

The perpetual testing of public school children is like a gardener constantly pulling his plants up by the roots to see if they are growing....(unknown)

Children require guidance and sympathy far more than instuction...Helen Kellers teacher

I hear and I forget I see and I remember I do and I understand...Confusious