My other life

A large part of who I am is missing from this blog.  That is my job as a Zumba instructor.  It has become a key part of who I am and how I live my life, so I feel compelled to write something about it here.  Yesterday was a good exemplar of it's impact.  I had some admin to do, emails, changing website etc, and got on with it in the morning whilst the kids happily played. I have always seen my work as implicit to our lives, and the kids just see it as part of life.  Yesterday was unusual, as I rarely spend a morning doing admin work, most of my Zumba work involves dancing or listening to music, or both.  The kids see me loving my work, and letting it just be a part of my life, and not really stopping me do other things, or being with them (well not too much anyway).  Having a working life outside of the kids is by no means essential to who I am, but it certainly has become a part of my life I would hate to give up.  I am in the lucky position that my job works in such a way that I can pick and choose how much, when and where I work, meaning that I can work it so my husband is (nearly) always home when I go out to work.  I do have to take advantage of some wonderful friends when that doesn't quite work as as expected though.

I found Zumba when my daughter was about 1 and we had a short term gym membership.  After a few sessions, I completely fell in love with the buzz and sense of joy it gave me every single moment of every single class.  Having danced (a bit) as a child, having taught a variety of things, and having run successful businesses,  I saw it as a perfect fit to become a zumba instructor myself.  I spent a few months building up my confidence and plucking up the courage to book myself in to the training course, but I did, and just over 1 month after the course, less than a year after taking my first class, I was in front of over 30 people running my own class.

The many many tales of Noo Noo and Poo Poo. dedicated to Uncle Drew

The Tale of Noo Noo and Poo Poo.  

By Autumn Elodie Roche

Poo Poo and Noo Noo went to poop and then they pooped on everything. And then guess what happened? They pooped on every other gap. And Noo Noo said, "let's poop on us". And then guess what happened? They pooped on where they poop. And then guess what happened? They Noo Nooped. Then they pooped on the Noo Noop. And then, guess what happened, they pooped on themselves. Again. 

Poo Wah Wah

By Autumn Elodie Roche

Noo Noo sucks up Poo Poo, and he pooed out a new Poo Poo. And then guess what happened. They pooped on every other gap, and pooped everywhere. And then, guess what happened. They pooped on themselves. And then, guess what happened. They pooped on the mirror. And then, guess what happened. They pooped on all the other mirrors. The End

Noo Noo and Poo Poo and the light switch.
By Autumn Elodie Roche


Noo Noo and Poo Poo went and they pooed on the light switch.  And then, guess what happened?  They pooed on every single light.  And then, guess what happened? They pooed on the turned off lights. And then they pooed on the floor. And that's what Poo Poo did, and Noo Noo sucked it all off. Then they pooed on the ceiling.  And then they pooed in the bath and turned the other Noo Noo's on.  And cleared up all the poos. And then, guess what happened? They pooed on themselves.  Poo Poo pooped on Noo Noo, and Noo Noo pooped on Poo Poo.  And then, guess what happened? The End.

Noo Noo and Poo Poo and the Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah
By Autumn Elodie Roche


Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah, he "wah's" every second Noo Noo and Poo Poo say something. Guess what Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah did. He wah'ed every second they made a noise with their footsteps, so Noo Noo makes a "schlurr" sound and Poo Poo makes a "plonk, plonk, plonk" sound.  And Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah, he "wah's" every time he walks. And then, guess what happened? The End.

Poo Poo, Noo Noo, Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah and baby Coo Coo
By Autumn Elodie Roche

Coo Coo, he pooed on everywhere where Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah, didn't "wah".  Then guess what happened.  Then they pooed on the light switch, then they pooed on the floor.  Then big Noo Noo cleaned it all up. Then, The End WAH WAH (Because Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah didn't want it to end, but it did) 

Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah, Poo Poo, Noo Noo, Coo Coo, and Moo Moo
By Autumn Elodie Roche

Moo Moo, mooed.  And then guess what happened. He mooed in every other gap.  And then Coo Coo wee'd all over the place.  And wee'd on Moo Moo's moo's.  And then guess what happened.  Poo Poo pooed wherever Coo Coo wee'd. And then guess what happened.  They pooped and pooped and pooped.  Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah pooed wherever everyone did they thing.  Noo Noo did the same thing as Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah did.  Wah Wah, The End Wah spoon Wah, The End  Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah said "wait a second, I didn't want it to end."  The End


Noo Noo, Poo Poo, Wet Wet, Coo Coo (when he was bigger) Moo Moo,  Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah and the light switch that they pooed on
By Autumn Elodie Roche

Noo Noo, Poo Poo, Wet Wet, Coo Coo (when he was bigger) Moo Moo,  Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah all pooed on trees.  Then Poo Poo had an idea, to poo on every other tree and everywhere else. It began to get too slippy for them.  All the different Noo Noo's sucked it all up together, working as a team.  "Please, never end this story" said Poo Poo Pants Wah Wah. The end  Whoops sorry.  And Bloo Bloo was in the last story.

The one where we meet Blue Blue
By Autumn Elodie Roche

Blue Blue was just coming to all the others, and everyone else had to get everything ready to welcome him.  They had to get the party food ready, because it was Blue Blue's birthday, and they got blue cake, and everything was blue.  The Blue Blue blar blar had some very blue words in it, and it had a video too.  And then, guess what happened.  He was just coming, and when he just saw all that blueness he went "Hooray!!!!"  and they danced and did everything they wanted and Blue Blue said "Please can it never end."  but it did.  They end.

When they all needed a giant Poo that filled up the whole house
By Autumn Elodie Roche

Everyone started to do a giant poo that filled the whole house up.  "Please can it never end." But the end.

So how do you teach them? I couldn't do it.

The simple answer is.  I don't.  We are all born with an innate capacity for learning, and are eager to do so all the time.  From the moment a baby explores it's own body in the womb, and realises that when they stretch or move, they often get a response, and they keep doing it.  They learn as babies, to imitate facial expressions, in those very early days - this is the beginnings of talking, and understanding emotions, developing relationships etc.  It just keeps on going.  I know that there are plenty of items for sale these days which claim to teach babies and toddlers things.  I'll let you into a secret.  They are lying.  These objects, however all-singing and all-dancing they are, will not "teach" your baby anything.  A definition of TEACH is "impart knowledge to or instruct (someone) as to how to do something".  

Do we need to "teach" a baby how to do the things they need to learn, or will they naturally learn the things they need in order to survive.  They learn to cry as tiny babies to communicate their needs, and human infants are pretty helpless in comparison to most of our mammalian cousins.  Did anyone have to teach that baby to cry in order to produce these results?  Not that I know of, and I certainly didn't teach it to my babies.

Okay, okay, I hear you say, I get all that about the baby and perhaps I see how that works for how a baby learns to crawl, and a toddler learns to walk.  But letting them follow their innate survival needs is not going to help them learn how to read, complete a quadratic equation, or analyse and dissect a piece of poetry or a history text.  I agree, that these other things, are not essential for our survival, in the way that communication and movement is, but I don't think that our amazing minds stop there.  I believe that we learn what we want according to what we see relevant and if there is a real need to learn that thing.  In addition, I believe that that learning is at it's best when it happens at a time, and place when we are most attuned to that thing.  At this time, we are able to take on a large body of knowledge, skills and understanding as motivation is high, and the need for props and special things to entice us to learn the thing are less necessary.  The need for excessive repetition becomes obsolete as we are much more able to retain things and use the information appropriately  is far greater with this internal motivation to succeed at our task.

So going back to the question,  "how do you teach them?" , I said "I don't".  And when asked this question, which I am asked every time I mention that I home educate my kids, I usually say, I don't teach them stuff.  I see myself as a facilitator of their learning.  Attempting to support them on their learning journey by providing an environment they like that gives them opportunities to learn in some of the ways they like, with time to spend just being themselves, being with friends.  I see every moment of every day as a learning opportunity.  We are really learning all the time.  Here are a few examples of what I mean by this.

Right now, as I speak the children are upstairs playing.  I don't know exactly what they are doing, but from what I can hear it involves the following things: Story stones (using characters from the film Frozen), Lego, penguins, and occasionally dialogue and storylines from the television program Strictly come dancing and the computer game Minecraft.  So apart from the things that I couldn't tell unless I did a full observation of them, here  are just a few of the things I know they are developing and learning (in my opinion)
Learning cooperation and leadership skills ~ they take turns in the dialogue, build joint things and collaborate in large projects, not just physical, but as a story / game.
Practising complex vocabulary from stories, experimenting with putting them into context.
Enjoying life
Relating to a peer
Understanding shape and space
Developing creatively through stories and making lego structures.
Developing a deeper understanding of new information - particularly evident through the introduction of penguins into recent play, which has responded to our penguin project.

Other days we might have a discussion whilst travelling asking about anything from architecture, to baby making, or days of the week to the ethics of large businesses.  I love it when we have these conversations, and I will be as helpful as they need me to be at the time, sometimes they are avidly interested and ask endless questions, and other times the moment passes without much conversation.  This is a common feature in family life.  We are super lucky that, as we have more time as a family together, these conversations and opportunities can be really capitalised upon.

I am relaxed about the learning process, as I know that my children are eager to learn, and when they recognise something as useful or important to them, they do all they can to gain the information they want.

We are often made to believe that our children aren't learning unless what they are learning can be ticked off on a curriculum checklist, but I would argue, that if the only learning that goes on can be ticked off on a curriculum checklist we are missing out.

I am not averse to providing a bit of structure to the children's learning from time to time, if they are receptive.  They usually, however, gain this more structured way of learning from educational websites which offer a motivating way of learning more structured stuff.  I don't know what my kids will be when they grow up, I don't know what they will have learned by the time they reach school-leaving age.  However, I find that exciting rather than scary.

Things I found really helpful when developing my ideas about learning include:

The work of Jerome Bruner - an educationalist who talks of intrinsic vs extrinsic motivation, among other things.

Ken Robinson - Changing Paradigms lecture

John Holt - Learning all the time, How children learn

September in pictures

Flower - Saxifrage

A beautiful flower, as via a nomination on facebook by my dear friend, and amazing artist Rowan Blair  He writes the most exquisite poetry:

The Flower
A Poem by Rowan Blair Colver

Bringing petal tips against the velvet of evening, like candle flicks that lightly glaze the air,
In stillness and enticement, some wonderful feeling of inner excitement, the flower opens.
Spilling pollen, aroma and life bringing colours, dusted with nectar and silk.
 Alluring sensual milk of the fiery eye, behind half closed lid in pressure to absorb,
Sensations. It is silent, almost silent, apart from the heart that pounds inside,
And the movement of the dream that forms in bubbles and quilts around the very mind,
It comes. Like the fox from a burrow, with its whiskery nose and flash of red, allowing the presence

Of whatever awaits to greet its awareness from outside the confiding of safety

Courtesy of Rowan Blair Colver weebly page  for more of this beauty check out this, and get weekly updates

Miraculous Mycellial

Autumn brings with it all sorts of beauty.  We are eager to explore fungus and learn more about it this year.  At Longshaw this week, lots of fungi spotted.  With the kids this week we are going to go through our new book and see if we can identify some of these.

Future Learn: Basic Science ~ Understanding Experiments

We have begun our very first Open University course this week.  It is ideal for home educators, and involves simple household equipment.  This is the link if you are interested in joining in:

This was our Potato experiment.  Trying to work out the water content of a potato.  We discovered this potato was fully dehydrated after 6 minutes of cooking in the microwave, when it promptly burst into flames. Using simple calculations derived from the mass difference we established that the potato had a water content of 90%  This was the children's first experience of using a simple xy axis analysis graph.

In the next experiment we looked at what happens to cucumber when allowed to rest in saline solution and distilled water.  We were left with a flabby and lighter cucumber slice in the saline and a denser heavier cucumber slice in the distilled water.  We have yet to discover why....

We have begun our very own field journal, where notetaking is made.  Quite exciting to have something like what the researchers use. We look forward to the next 3 weeks of the course, and probably courses in the future on other subjects.

When looking over the results and the notes we discovered that we were learning about the process of Osmosis and how liquids like to be at an quilibrium but if there is a semi permeable membrane in the way there is a possibility that the liquids cannot pass through from one place to another because the size of the parts are too big - we used a sieve and a colander to demonstrate this on a practical level.

WEEK 2

This week we learned about properties of solids and liquids, and their corresponding densities. Using an ice tray and some liquids as well as a freezer.  See the picture below for our results.

We learned that whilst water in its solid state (ice) decreases in density, and therefore floats, this is due to the hexagonal structure that is created when it freezes which takes up more room than the water molecules in their liquid form.  This is, however, unique to water, and is not found in other liquids, whose solids would sink in their liquid form.  Sadly, as both the extra liquids we chose were water-based - despite my best efforts to persuade them to use other liquids, we only saw this difference in Olive Oil.  The demonstration on video showed this happen with honey though, so the children witnessed this, even though it was secondhand.

WEEK 3

This week we are looking at conditions necessary for living and thriving.  We are doing this with really basic organisms - yeast.

Back at the Deep - Gentoo Penguins

We've not been to the Deep for quite a while, so decided that since we no longer have a Chatsworth pass we decided to get an annual pass to the Deep this year.  As we prefer things quieter we thought the first week the children go back to school would be a fairly safe bet.  As it happens there were two school trips, but fortunately they didn't disrupt our day out too much.  We had a fabulous day, especially thanks to the Gentoo Penguins who had arrived earlier this year.  We were with our friends and we have both decided to do a project on penguins in follow up to this.  As a prelude to our visit we decided to watch a recent documentary on penguins which I had noticed on iplayer called "The Wonder of Animals".   It is a fascinating program with new insight into the behaviour of Penguins and why they do the things they do.  It was great to have watched this beforehand, as some of the behaviour that was explained in the program was displayed by the Gentoos in our presence.  Namely the wiggling and preening they tend to do in the water prior to jumping out.  It appears that they are allowing air bubbles to get in between the feathers to allow them to become more buoyant and use the air expelling to propel them about double the speed, and literally fly out of the water onto land.  A truly impressive display which I managed to capture on film. Can't seem to upload as it is a really big file... I might try youtubing it and linking.

The children spent a good while at the lagoon area and coral reef drawing and painting, which I really encourage as it gives the children time to really and truly observe what they are seeing.  I found it interesting to notice how fleeting the glances other people made at the lagoon, quickly snapping a photo with their camera and moving on to other things.