Day 1

What a day!

5th October 2021

As this was our first day of home schooling, I wanted to do something special to mark the ending of something and the beginning of something else. 

Kinda like an initiation, or a ritual or something that felt meaningful.  This got us talking about Indigenous cultures and how they mark time and special occasions.

We sat outside in the garden, the morning sun on our faces & drank smoothies.

We spoke about what we wanted from this year and how it felt to be free of school & schedules & talked about all the things we wanted to learn and places we wanted to go.  (The Great Barrier Reef, Uluru, Ballarat & Jenolan Caves were put on the list!)

Breakfast Smoothies in the Sun ❤️

I want to incorporate some meditation into our home school day, so we closed our eyes where we sat in the long clover (the lawn is desperate for a mow!) and talked about the earth always being there for us, and we listened to the wind and felt the soft clover, and the warm sun. 

It’s a nice place to return to when you’re tired and stressed.

“It felt so good sitting there, with nowhere to be.  No hurdles to jump & no deadlines to make.  It was just us, on a Tuesday morning, in the sun.”

We talked about being connected to everything & nature having all the answers, and if you calmed your mind, and asked your questions, the earth would always answer you. 

It didn’t last for long.  Maybe 10 minutes, but it was very sincere and very sweet.  I hoped they would remember it forever.  (But probably not, sigh)

We decided we wanted to choose a spirit animal.  An animal that felt special in our hearts.

Drawing on Australian Aboriginal culture we made up a dreamtime story about our animal and drew a picture. (Watch real dreamtime stories in the link below)

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=dreamtime+stories+for+kids

Dreamtime Stories & Spirit Animals

Lincoln chose a wolf.

Mila chose a cat & I chose a turtle.  (We recently spoke about using a ‘poetic licence’ & so Mila spelt cat with a K. Ha!)

It was such a nice morning!

Next, we took our dog Pepe to the oval for a run around.  He’s a retired Greyhound and loves a good run.  

It seems strange to just go and hang out with the dog in the middle of the day.  Even though, I’ve been told it’s ok to home school, you’re not going to fall behind or anything, I still felt a bit anxious, like we needed to get back & hit the books!!

Liam had finished work when we got home and we all had lunch.  (They ate all of it!  Not like school where they come home with a full lunch box & tell me, ‘I didn’t have time’)

The kids ran around after lunch.  There favourite game at the moment is to hose the trampoline, get the cake of soap from the bath & lather the tramp so it’s super slippery then run around until you fall over.  Repeat.  It’s a bit cute.

Err….Lunch Break?! 😆

Watch Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0HPXHveyso

Earlier that morning, we spoke about making cinnamon scrolls, & so those came next.  I picked up a packet mix from the store & let them at it.

I knew it would be messy, but whatever, that’s the point right?  Let them figure it out.  They prepped the oven, measured, co-operated, they did it all.

Turns out the smell of warm cinnamon scrolls wafting out of the oven is pretty motivating to plough through 4 pages of maths without a peep. 😊

After maths we sat down for afternoon tea.  The scrolls were delicious!  The kids were so pleased with themselves.

We clocked off the day just after 4pm. That’s long for home school. They tell me its only 3 hours a day.

We went slow and took our time.

It was such a lovely pace & even though I still feel a bit like ‘don’t worry it was only the first day, we’ll do lots more work tomorrow!’ I am happy with our day.

There were lots of laughs, lots of gentle moments, lots of learning, co-operating, reading, comprehending, maths, creating, drawing, writing, dog time, family lunch, tramp time & just a pinch of he said/she said……

Is that enough??