Day 15

25th October 2021

We Quit!

We had such a fun weekend together. (Liam & I even snuck off for a day date!)

We had a beautiful morning today, and then as soon it comes time to do our core we get grumpy faces, angry storm outs and drama. 😒

Well, I’m done.

I keep fighting the Monica inside my head:

“C’mon guys, fill the books!” She rallies.

“Don’t you wanna tick the boxes?!”

But something’s taking over, & I’m ready to launch into ‘Smelly Cat’ just to drown her out. (Maybe I’m Phoebe after all? 🤔)

” I’m letting it all go!”

I’ve really struggled with this for a couple of weeks now.

There’s schooling in me, and I didn’t even know it. 😞

I bet it’s in you too.

Liam & Lisa — Waiting for our lunch at the amazing food truck in Culburra.

Culburra Garden — The warm sun & the lush garden….Day dates rule.

Liam & Lisa at the beach. — This looks glamourous right? We both fell asleep on the sand shortly after taking this picture. Food truck coma! 😴 💜💚🧡

So, I met a new home school mum on the weekend for a playdate. She has 2 kids similar ages to ours and while they played, we sat and had a good chat.

This brave woman took her eldest child out of school in year 1, and her second child has never set foot in a school!

Her children were kind, polite & friendly.

And chatty!

Usually, kids won’t say that much to adults, but this one little guy in particular aged 9 was such a conversationalist. I mean, we were talking about investing and all sorts of things.

He was interesting & funny & home educated & 9.

So, this family travelled around Europe with their children, in a motor home for a year & didn’t even open a single textbook.

She said they learnt SO MUCH.

She said a lot of the information was learnt through conversations & observations.

This got me thinking about our family and how we live our life outside of home school.

We talk with our children all the time.

On our way to the playdate Lincoln asked what the centre lines mean on the road and why the lines keep changing? This led to a full discussion about road safety, communicating without words, recognising when it is safe to overtake and so on.

We have lots of chats like this.

This new home school friend said after they ‘unschooled’ for a year her children became curious about learning all on their own and began researching topics they were naturally interested in.

“We didn’t do any maths, but we did almost a year of history!”

They are so interested in history!

The unschooling mindset is, if the child is interested in the subject, they will learn faster, and retain the information longer.

She went on to say, when they did begin learning more about maths her kids were so much older and understood the concepts a lot easier & faster.

Mila studying English — Mila dutifully beginning English this morning.

Mila's English workbook — When she learns the words, she gets to complete the art. She LOVES this. Such a drawer this one.

Lincoln doing an ollie. — Here’s Lincoln *not* completing his English. (Although he has learnt to ollie on his skateboard)

Lincoln & Mila learning how to ollie — Now that he’s an expert, he called Mila down to teach her how to do an ollie.

Pivot

The next page in Mila’s English book was a Geography lesson. She started to whine that she had already done enough ‘work’ today.

I said, “Ok, fair enough.”

We closed her book & I got out the world map & said do you remember where the Czech Republic is?

Her whole mood changed.

Her eyes lit up. “Yes mama, it’s here!”

She began telling me how the Czech Republic is landlocked and was next to Poland & Germany, blah blah blah.

THEN,

Mr I’m-not-doing-any-work joins in and they began quizzing each other on countries for around 10 minutes.

They discovered the flags were lined up on the top and bottom of the map.

Then then discovered something interesting about the flags of Poland & Indonesia!

Lincoln & Mila studying the world map — Lincoln & Mila learning without even knowing it. They’re teaching me that learning should be about discovery, not schooling.

World flags — “Hey mama, look at Poland & Indonesia’s flags?”

Coincidence?

Not long after we had been discussing Indonesia and Poland there was a knock on the door.

Our favourite day of the month came early.

Universal Yums (http://thehomeschoolyear.com/Universal%20Yums)!!

Guess what country we got this time?

Watch Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xP3MABN6Y0

We learnt what a coincidence was and then they got mad because I told them they had to wait for Dad before we got stuck in to the treats.

I sent them to their rooms with the facts and the map to calm down, & when I checked on them a few minutes later, they were studying together in Mila’s room.

Studying facts about Indonesia. — They ended up studying after all – together.

Universal Yums Box — Universal Yums (http://thehomeschoolyear.com/Universal%20Yums) – Our most favourite resource so far.

Mr Wordsmith

To be more creative with resources, I purchased ‘Storyteller’s Word A Day’ by Mr Wordsmith (http://thehomeschoolyear.com/Mr%20Wordsmith) and it came today!

It was such an exciting day for deliveries. (Even Dad’s fancy GF beer arrived. Everyone got a parcel!)

So, this book stands up right and each day the children flip the page to learn the new word.

Pretty cool.

Our first word was ‘Swagger’ and yep, we practised our swagger up and down the hallway until they got silly and we fell on the floor laughing, like the end of Pepper Pig.