Clumber park, cycling, microscopes and squirrels

A change of timetable this week let to a free day on Monday.  I thought a great opportunity to get to grips with the organisation of drawers in the living room.  the kids, on the other hand had other plans - an outing was in order, and since Evan has been keen on cycling later I suggested going to Clumber park, which I know has some great flat cycling routes.  I hadn't been since I was a child, but it was a good opportunity to take advantage of the beautiful weather we've been having lately.

We took the bikes and trailer, as I didn't feel Evan would get much of a cycle if we were hampered going at Autumn's pace.  We chose the shortest route around the park, which was a circuit of the lake, which I presumed had to be pretty flat.  It was billed at 5 miles, I thought that was pretty doable. We head of with a little trepidation as Evan is a bit nervous of junctions on roads, but I managed to convince him that the junctions we were encountering were nice and empty of traffic ( thankfully they were), and after a little shaky start we head off.  We chatted as we went about what we saw, a lovely freedom of cycling together with someone.

I got to thinking on our journey round the lake, about how much learning was going on during this day.  An idea I was drawn back to later in the day during a conversation with someone about how we home educate.  I was asked... "I bet it's hard to do home schooling on a day like this."  my reply was, "on the contrary, we did a tonne of it on our trip out today."  I then went on to list a few of the things that sprung to mind which would directly translate to the school education system curriculum, like Biology - exploring habitats of animals and small creatures, using the skull of a mammal to discover what it is, what it might eat, where it might live.  We also were exploring the laws of physics through the bouncy seesaw, and how to get up a hill successfully when cycling, versus how to find the process too difficult, how to get a swing going with someone else suing weight shifting.  We engaged in no written work, but that didn't mean the learning processes were any less important.  On the contrary, I feel that the learning taking place today, and every day, allows true and honest  organic engagement with the subject matter, exploring it to the level felt appropriate at the time, leaving a far greater and lasting impression that learning taking place in a more structured traditional fashion.  It is quite scary at times, and I do sometimes feel nervous about whether the fundamentals of life will be acquired, but then we have days like today which remind me to allow the children to enjoy their childhood and give them the space to be themselves and explore at their own pace.  In my heart I know and trust that they really will learn all they need to learn.

Back to Clumber Park... here we see Evan feeding this squirrel.  I felt a little uncomfortable about this, because of the close contact, but as it was safe enough, and risk levels fairly low, I let it go.  He loved it.

We nearly passed the Discovery centre, as it was a small entrance, and we planned to go on another cycle.  I was so glad we popped in.  It was really a discovery centre (we've been in a few discovery centres before which are less discovery, more a few photos).  Loads of interesting interactive displays, child-friendly microscopes with loads of slides.

 Teamwork

We are really excited about Clumber park, we'll be back soon.  We will definitely going to look into a Home Educators National Trust membership.  

Science club: SOUND

Today was science club.  We did loads of activities and experiments about sound.  We used the following books for our experiments - Usborne 100 Science experiments, Super Science Experiments and Make it Work! Sound. The authors and publishers of which we are very grateful.

We started off by exploring the garden trying to make the largest sound possible with just one bang.  They started small by just exploring the musical instruments, but then explored further by going round the garden.  They discovered that the wheelbarrow was the loudest they could find when hit with an object.  We discussed a bit about materials, and which ones made the loudest sounds.  Evan found that plastic made the least sound, whilst wood was a bit louder and metal was the loudest.

We followed this by a series of activities which I are shown pictorially below.

We used a sound cannon to blow a candle flame... later we took one end off this and were able to actually blow it out.

We then watched a favourite television program called Miracles of Nature (from 18 minutes in)

the episode concerned with Echolocation. The technology information of which is shown here. We followed this up by trying out our own little bit of echolocation in the garden.

Using our own ability to notice if we were in open or closed in spaces by clicking.  They did remarkably well.  I was very impressed.

The children next had a go at feeling and seeing sound through the effect of the vibrations from a speaker.  This was a real hit, and later they demonstrated how the jewels moved by bouncing on the trampoline.

More seeing the effect of sound through vibrations on a drum - this time sugar on top of a stretched balloon over a glass. All of them loved the end of this activity which involved the tongue doing in the inevitable.

Next we looked at amplification using funnels in the form of making a duck sound using a paper cup, string and a wet towel.  Evan explored what happened without the wetness and without the cup, and found that without the wetness there wasn't the sound at all, and without the cup it was a quiet noise.  Plus, they all made megaphones which were super effective and simple, a great way to feel vibrations of the voice on your lips.

Now this strange looking photo we are demonstrating a tuning fork.  We literally have forks connected to thread wrapped to our fingers which are in turn sitting on our ears.  The sound is transferred and we hear it really loud after we dong the fork onto a hard surface.

We changed the pitch a few times by adding extra water and keeping them at different levels.

The whole session was super quick, and was a platform to inspire and start learning about the subject of sound.  I would hope the children now have a few ideas of how to explore these concepts themselves at their own pace now.  There was a bit of discussion here and there about the scientific conclusions we can make from our findings, but we did keep it fairly light and exploratory.

Could felting be any more fun... we think so

Today our friends from "I love you more than rainbows" blog (well they our real life friends, but also have a home ed blog!) came over for a crafting morning.  Jasmin said she fancied a spot of felting, so we set to it.  She decided on her colours and that she would make a brooch from flat felt cut out and sewed together.  Autumn decided to make a picture, Debs to make a mobile phone case, and I couldn't make up my mind so decided to just make some flat felt which I could go on to make something out of later.  Evan, however, decided to make some slippers!

I have made felt now quite a number of times using different methods, but this one we used today is by far my favourite for it's fullness of fun.

For speed I'm going to do a quick bullet point list of the method, for fullness you will have to explore elsewhere.

1. Lay out a square of bubble wrap about 40% larger than the piece of felt you want.
2. Tease out wool so that it is fairly evenly spread out.
3. Lay out the teased wool first vertically down your bubble wrap.
4. Lay out more teased wool this time horizontally on top of the first layer.
5. Add any detail on top with teased wool - wisps, stripes, swirls. (remember that the result will be an approximation of your design, intricate designs can be done using appliqué or needle felting.)
6.  Sprinkle soapy water across the wool, spreading thinly and evenly (or use a spray - much quicker and easier!)
7. Put another layer of bubble wrap, (or plastic bag) over the wool.
8. Roll up tightly.
9. Secure with elastic bands (3 or more works well)
10. Cover with a towel if you want to avoid getting wet hands (secure with more bands)
... NOW FOR THE FUN BIT
11. First squeeze the tube gently across the middle all the way along
12. Now whack it, throw it, and generally have a brilliant, silly time with it.
(we threw ours down the stairs, whacked them on the floor, door frames, and you can hold them between 2 people and wiggle hard too!)
13. After about 5 minutes or so remove the bands and carefully unroll.
14. Check it over for bits your don't want and that the process is working well.  This checking process is important to make sure it is all done at the same time, as once the process gets past a certain point it is difficult to incorporate any stray bits.
15. Re-roll and repeat.
16. Repeat processes 12-15 until you feel it is all coming together nicely, and looking less translucent.
17. When you are happy with it, it is time to finish it by plunging and chucking. (my personal favourite bit)
18. Take the unrolled felt and plunge it into cool water.
19. Squeeze it out leaving it wet without dripping
20. Keep in the ball and chuck it hard onto a hard surface.
21.  Gather up using 2 hands and repeat.  Do this lots of times, re plunging if it gets too dry.
22.  When you can see it has reduced in size significantly, thickened up and puckered across the surface, you have done.
23. Rinse it out and dry.

As Evan was making a 3D object he utilised a slightly different method.  Here goes:

1. Make a template, using oilcloth or similar, of your feet about 2cm bigger all round.
2. Follow other method up to 7 making sure 2 separate pieces are done, and both about half a hands width extra around the sides.
3. Put template on top and fold excess around the template
4. Now follow 7-16
5. Open up hole in the middle and remove oilcloth.
6. Place on feet.
7. Ensure wet.
8. Put on a pair of wellies.
9. Jump, stomp, dance around for about half an hour. ENJOY.
10. Remove, check and repeat if necessary.
11. When happy do the plunging and chucking but only a few times as we don't want to shrink it too much.
12. To finish you can sew any bits on you like, add some leather soles, decorations or anything you like really.
13. ENJOY

Wild about Play here we come.

We have a ridiculous number of amazing resources on our doorstep here in Sheffield.  We are so lucky.  We have decided to make use of one we have been aware of for a while now in the form of an outdoor Kindergarten with a Home Education session.  Wild About Play is run by a fantastic group of enthusiastic professionals who are totally passionate about giving children the opportunity to explore nature and natural materials in an autonomous and exciting way.

We went to an open morning a few months ago, but due to it being really busy Evan wasn't eager to return; so we had been doing things with local group FoCAL  at Woodland Camp, and Forest Kindergarten, both of which starred the inimitable Emma Condor.  Circumstances have coincided now that we have decided to indulge our passion for the woods by attending Forest School, with the added bonus of Emma now working here!!!!  Today was the first day, and I had the pleasure of staying as Evan felt he needed me there.  I was really glad that I could stay as I got to see the amazing resource come to life.

How many ways can you cross a river?

The Home Ed group spent part of the morning developing a waterway to the river, this a small portion of what they created after much problem solving and creative thinking. 

I was most impressed with the lack of rules - only simple rules to keep people from seriously harming themselves.  It gave all the children the real sense of freedom that really we all desire in our lives.  Exploring the idea of conformism this week has been a theme for me due to a number of circumstances, and finishing the week off in this magical atmosphere really foots the bill for me.

Thank you to everyone at Wild About Play for creating such an amazing and inspirational environment which gives children the space they need and crave.  You are wonderful.