A year in the making.....

I have not blogged in a while, so my new promise to myself (and to you) is to start blogging more regularly!

A lot has been going on since my last update and I have so much I want to share that I'm not sure where to start.......  let's start with:

Sophie......
She was in school, then out of school, then in school, and then.... out of school!  Sophie rejoined us after the Summer Half-term break for a whole variety of reasons.  Although we are still all getting used to the change in dynamics (again) I am so pleased she is home and with us.  Sophie is now eating, sleeping, laughing and resting (and arguing with siblings but we shall skim over that bit), and has a renewed enthusiasm for learning.  We have decided to follow the GCSE option for her, so she will be studying for her Art (at a local adults college), Maths (with a tutor) and Biology (with me) GCSEs over the next 12 months.

New additions......

Bodhi

Out for a morning walk

As well as having Sophie back, we have 6 new additions to the Horler 'school'.  Bodhi is our rescue puppy from  Battersea , and arrived on the 9 June.  He has settled well, and of course gets lots of attention all day.  We have worked his walk into our unschooling day, so you may see us around the village between 9 and 10ish.  I love this time as I either have really interesting conversations with the children (I normally take one of them for 1-2-1 time), or I can have a short amount of thinking time-out for me.

The other 5 additions our a rescue chickens; Ben built a fantastic Chicken Pen and we brought a house on ebay for them.  We now have between 3 - 5 eggs a day so are completely self-sufficient with eggs!  Lily and Noah have taken on a lot of the day-to-day care of them and enjoy this immensely.

The Chucks!

Autonomous Education.....
I attended an autonomous education conference in July; although there were parts of the day I found frustrating and a little un-relevant to us as family, it completely restored my belief in autonomous education as the way forward for us!  I have noticed how much the children learn without me, and as knowledge is at their fingertips through the internet, libraries, stories etc, I am not sure that 'teaching' is relevant.  Children are not empty vessels waiting to be filled; they are amazing, individual, unique spirits who know what they want to learn about when they are inspired.  They have their own learning styles that do not always fit in with our modern view of 'learning', and we believe that they really, really do not need to have 10 GCSE's in a range of subjects that they will soon forget about once they have left school in order to get on with life. Through the autonomous route, learning is not in a 'neat linear' way, but in a random almost 'haphazard' way..... BUT they learn ALL THE TIME!  Even when they're not 'doing' something deemed as learning, they still learn!  A great book that helps you understand this The Unschooling Handbook - but you can google and find/see lots of different ways that families are learning together.


Reflection.....

A colourful meal and life!

We have been home-unschooling for a year now; I have learnt so much; about me, my children, life, love, saddness, patience, laughter, friends, fear, courage, rain (!), gardening to name a few. (Phew!).....  I would not change what we have done for a second, I love it and I love the adventure we are on.  Today I made a delicious meal of salads; it was full of colour, spice, flavours, home grown food, shop brought food; the children picked and chose what appealed most, they tasted something they weren't sure about, and we shared, laughed, grumbled and savoured - just like our unschooling life!

angela x