In sickness and in homeschool...

The wheel really came off this week when I was ill! I lost my voice on the weekend and so have been practising 'parenting without voice' (God has a sense of humour) and schooling without teacher!! Ha ha. Actually Matthew has been around (he had to stay at home for his own health at the beginning of the week, and then I have been incredibly ill for 2 days with mastitis so he had to stay at home as much of yesterday as possible, and then all of today). Of course Matthew is the teacher too (the Biblical homeschoolers say he is Principal of our Homeschool - I do agree with that but I don't think we are as Biblical as them in other ways). Seeing as this blog is fairly new (although not widely read!) I will stay away from *Biblical* controversy for now. :)

So school has been a very natural thing recently! They made a volcano village, it finally erupted on Tuesday (separate post to come about that) and have done various other things.

Good opportunity arose yesterday when Grandma visited and had her magic reading tests in her bag. I don't really care too much for diagnostic-thingys but I can say that because so far whenever we've done one it has been really encouraging. I will say here what the results are (and what they were last August).

Little H#1 is 7 years 5mths old. Waddington Reading Comprehension Test 2: 10 yrs 6 mths, Burt Word recognition reading test: 10 years 11 months, Spelling age 10.2. (August he was Reading Comprehension: 9 yrs 7mths, Word recogntion 9yrs 11mths, Spelling age 9yrs).

Little H#2 is 5 years 2mths old. Waddington Reading Comprehension Test 2: 8yrs 4 mths, Word recognition reading test: 8 yrs 1mth. I spared him the ordeal of a spelling test because we are still beginning writing and he is keen but I don't want to push it. He enjoyed the reading tests though. (Last August his Waddington Reading Comprehension Test 1 was 6yrs 1 mth (at the age of 4 yrs 5 mths).

Very encouraging and a fine day's work for them when I was able to do absolutely nothing myself and was glad of the extra pair of hands for a few hours.

I have to say though, that being so ill (though it rarely happens) seems worse when we are homeschooling. In reality though I have more helpers at home, we don't have a school run and They. Can. Still. Learn.

I forgot to mention that yesterday morning Little H#1 had a craft project in mind (he thinks a lot and reads in his room before we know he is awake a lot of the time) and he drew a jungle picture and tore up bits of different coloured paper to make a kind of mosaic collage. It was a family affair and his brother did it too. They just did it together with a little Daddy help in the drawing stages. This morning before I had braved even calling it morning he came into our room fully dressed and announced he had finished his maths in the playroom. They have a table in there we tend to work together on now, and I haven't cleared it in a few days and put the schoolwork back on the shelf. That was a definite high to start the day.

They ended the day with a Daddy and boys' adventure out to Waterfall Gully after Little H#2's and 3's sleep, and #1's 'reading in cubby' time. I was finally able to stand and cooked the tea and just enjoyed the baby for a bit.

That's how sickness and homeschool have looked in our house recently. Writing it down is good, it helps me to see the light that what we are doing is ok, and works even when it isn't Working.