I thought I’d already done August Homeschool Miscellany but apparently I’d done July and collected photos for August but not actually written the post. Oops. So everything ended up getting grouped as I’ve been struggling this year. It’s no accident that October was left out, apparently we didn’t do anything that I could include. Goolugatup Heathcote Museum We initially heard that there was a museum in the building of the Heathcote Cultural Precinct when we attended a relative’s birthday party there. The precinct was a mental institution in the 1920s for mildly afflicted people and was one of the pioneering ones that broke away from the methods that seem to result in buildings being haunted.

This was written for my 15yo who hates bookwork but has grudgingly accepted that that’s how some things have to be learned. It was written to squeeze in once a week but ideally should probably be done every day (he is trying at least XD). If you’re a bit more enthusiastic you can substitute the ORs for ANDs. Maths Two pages out of each workbook

I wrote July HS Misc pretty late at night and completely forgot I had told @bearone I would do this one (which is “the next one” from my last one XD) with explanations as to how our crazy shenanigans can translate into stuff to soothe the Education Department. Was going to edit the original post but it got a bit messy and I started rewriting the entire thing so thought it might be somewhat safer to do a “companion” type post. And I’ll be somewhat recycling the photos from that post (though I think I’ll just screenie the sets to make my life easier), so watch out for the fake wounds again.

WARNING: there are fake wounds made of Vaseline, flour and red food colouring about halfway through this post. Broke the habit! For now. My head is still all over the place and and trying to get and keep organised is presenting its usual massive challenge, exacerbated by the fact the children have been staggering being exhausted for no apparent reason lately (a possible reason is growth spurts, because they’re lethargic and sleep a lot and suddenly they’re bigger, especially the boys).

I think I’ve inadvertently set that precedent I was trying to avoid x_x I blame covid. During the period of “self isolation” (we were advised to not go out unless it was for essential purposes such as grocery shopping but full lockdown was never enforced), aside from occasionally trying to push bookwork (which is always destined for failure when everyone hates it so much), we all ended up just doing our own thing.

If you know that I only clump months if at least one of them has been quiet/lazy what does this tell you? XD I also did it at the end of last year I hope that didn’t set a precedent >_> For new readers, December is usually insanomonth when all the end of year shenanigans occur on top of silly season shenanigans, so while I still try to squeeze some things in, it usually (but not always) ends up a write-off as far as the socially accepted definition of education goes. It seems that January has become my planning month. I can’t remember if I usually take a month to plan anyway but I definitely needed it after last year, and most of it was probably taken up researching and writing up the planning budget which I’ve never done before and numbers always take longer anyway even if all I’m doing is making sure spreadsheet formulas and data entry are correct (again for new readers, I’m somewhat dyscalculiac which is why I try not to help with anything other than basic maths).

Everything kind of completely fell apart in October. 12yo had caught everything under the sun in Term 3 and so had missed a fair chunk of it. At the beginning of Term 4 she continued insisting that she loved school and still wanted to go, but two weeks in I could count on one hand the number of times she had actually gone. She kept insisting she was “sick” or “too tired” but would always be better just in time for gymnastics. Things eventually came to a head when we had a massive blowout as I told her if she was really that sick then she was not going to gymnastics so she could recover properly and she told me to pull her out of school so she could go to gym (a threat I’d made a few times previously but hadn’t done because I give too many chances). I tried to get her to be reasonable and told her she could go to gym, and then she had to go to school for the rest of the week. If she wanted to quit after that she was to tell me on the weekend and I could pull her out and she could go back to homeschooling, if she wanted to keep going then she had better have as close to a perfect attendance as possible for the rest of the term, and if she didn’t go the following day then I was pulling her out that day.

Comp season is one of our quieter periods and between that and juggling school transportation and crammed work days we got even less done than usual. I was going to put together a compilation video of all the routines but some combination of my phone and computer has been giving me an inordinate amount of trouble has made getting photos and videos off it way harder than it should be in this day and age and I’ve given up on that for now. That is one of the main reasons why I’m so horribly behind on hs misc.

This is primarily for my boys (14yo is currently interested in law, 10yo in marine biology). We use Khan Academy because that was what was freely available when I started looking into homeschooling resources. First and foremost Everything requires basic literacy and numeracy. So get through the high school maths on KA (start at your grade level, if it’s too hard, play down, if it’s too easy, play up, if you’re in high school/over grade 8 and it’s too hard, keep dropping til you can do it, then work back up).

The mess that has been this year continued along with my sustained failing to manage one in school and two out. I’ve ended up palming most of the school-related stuff off to JJ, which has mostly been parent/teacher meetings and he’s supposed to be helping her with homework and doing the admin stuff too but somehow I’m still getting stuck with that (guess the 12yo is just used to me dealing with most things).