It's that time of year...

... that feels like endings and new beginnings all rolled into one. Summer feels definitely over, what with all the rain we've been having, the drop in temperature and the darkness falling that bit earlier each evening. I've been looking at my woodpile and thinking that I really must ring the coalman. Autumn feels like it's here already even though the leaves are still green on the trees and the sun is shining intermittently today. My neighbour has just cut his immaculate allotment grass and I can smell the smell of fresh grass clippings coming through the open front door. Lovely :)

I can feel my annual urge to start knitting creeping up on me, as well as the need to bake and make jam. I reckon it's all part of some ancient ancestral memory type thing - preparing for the winter ahead and the times when food should be scarce, except it isn't anymore because we shop rather than hunter-gather.

There's an element of this holing-up-for-winter going on in our Home Ed life too. This time of year lots of people are posting about their plans for their children in the upcoming academic year which is calling me to assess our achievements and think about what we need to do here in the coming non-school year. Mainly though I am fighting a really strong urge to go out and buy stationery, pencils, pens and pencil cases. We really don't need them but they all look so shiny and tempting in the shops, so fresh and clean and unused. Maths sets in tins and notebooks with fancy covers are oh, so tempting :)

Anyway, plans for my children. In some ways, I don't really have any. Or at least, not any new ones particularly, or rather, not any set-in-stone-and-can't-be-changed ones. I don't follow school term-times so there is no real sense of new books and new stuff that goes with starting a new school year. They'll get new text books and exercise books when they finish the old ones, which is just as likely to be in February as in September.

There are lots of out-of-home activities on our calendar that they will continue with. They both do tap and ballet, drama, ninjitsu, Sunday school and scouting. Individually, The Girl does singing, piano and rounders, which will stop for the winter; Boykin does parkour and cricket, the latter will also stop for the winter.

Any book learning has to fit in around those activities whilst allowing plenty of time to play (so essential) and also fit around the monthly Home Ed groups that we attend - book group, themed session, rollerblading, board games group, craft group and history club trips. Even though they are 13 and 9, I still try to keep their learning fun and as playful as possible. Maths is probably the most serious subject that they do - mainly because it is the one thing that I insist on rather than them requesting it - except on Fridays when it's fun maths and we play games or use Ginn Extension Mathematics: Investigations, Games and Puzzles Level 5 .

So these are resources I intend on using with them this year and some ideas of things they think they would like to do at this point in time. Everything (apart from MEP maths and Picture Book Explorers) may be changed at any time and with no prior warning if it doesn't suit, or if they develop a passion for something new :)

The Girl
MEP Maths Secondary
So you really want to learn English Book 1
So You Really Want to Learn French Book 1: A Textbook for Key Stage 2 and Common Entrance
Edexcel International GCSE Human Biology Student Book
Music Theory book - don't know which one yet, will have to see what her music teacher suggests
Certain sections of Picture Book Explorers

She also wants to do more cooking; finish building her garden to her own design; redecorate her bedroom and continue her sewing projects with her Nana.

Boykin
MEP Maths Primary
Understanding English: Spelling (Series of 7): KS2, Years 3 - 6
Understanding English: Grammar (Series of 7): KS2, Years 3 - 6
Understanding English: Punctuation (Series of 7): KS2, Years 3 - 6
Handwriting Practice 2 (of 2): KS1/KS2, Years 1 - 6
So You Really Want to Learn Science Book 1: A Textbook for Key Stage 2 and Common Entrance Picture Book Explorers 

He wants to practise his throwing and catching skills for the next cricket season; go swimming more often; do more cub badges; do more cycling; practise his magic tricks and play out more.

Together
The Story of the World: Middle Ages - From the Fall of Rome to the Rise of the Renaissance v. 2
Schofield & Sims Verbal Reasoning Tests
Schofield & Sims Non-verbal Reasoning Tests
Schofield & Sims Essential English Skills
Da Vinci: His Life and his legacy Unit Study
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra schools music resources
ETA: Lego Storystarter kit
         James Dyson Foundation STEM challenge cards

They have also both asked for a new series of Picture Book Explorers and some Chapter Book Explorers too, so watch this space :)

Visit White Scar Caves

We went on a Home Ed trip yesterday with a group of other families.
We drove for 2 hours to get to White Scar Cave in North Yorkshire which is the longest show cave in England. It was a bit colder than we expected and I soon discovered that it would've helped if I'd read the website properly before we set off, instead of only looking at the map of how to get there just before we left. Duh!

The tour was very interesting and the guide was lovely. There's not much time to dawdle though as the tours are obviously carefully timed so that different groups pass at set places where the passages are wide enough.

Boykin was very interested in what the guide was telling us about calcite and stalagmitic columns. It was interesting to hear how the stalactites and stalagmites are formed and at what rate - 1 cubic cm every 150 years or so!

The story of how the cave was discovered is also interesting, if not a little very unnerving. There's a model near the entrance showing how Christopher Long, the first person to enter the cave, travelled to the first waterfall, on his belly in a tunnel just a few cms high with four candles in front of him, not knowing at all what he would find in there. Brave or crazy?

The story of the discovery of the Battlefield cave is as equally unnerving. A young woman named Hilda Guthrie swam under a giant boulder in the dark, again, not knowing what she would find. She crawled up a narrow tunnel and found the huge cavern with it's amazing array of straw stalactites. Brave or crazy?

I have to confess, caving is not exactly my idea of fun. There were some low sections and some narrow sections, luckily not narrow and low at the same time. The passages are all well lit, and the low sections were tall enough for Boykin to walk through without banging his head. The tour is about two thirds of a mile in each direction and you will need good waterproof footwear. Most of the walk is on metal grids but there was one small puddle that I managed to get wet feet in, having gone in my walking sandals :/

Definitely wear an extra layer and maybe even a pair of gloves if you like toasty fingers. There's a cafe with a gift shop that could do with a better range of postcards but has a good range of stones. It's well worth a visit and, as you come out, the view of Whernside in the sunshine is doubly magnificent after being in a cave for an hour and a half :)