January Homeschool Miscellany

One of the good things about The Big Reset (although the kids don’t really feel it at the time) is the slow and very limited internet (my parents actually have a quota as they don’t use nearly as much internet as we do or more specifically as the kids do), which means they tend to spend slightly less time on their devices. The boys actually spent a few nights playing chess against each other and JJ, and Sprat taught them how to play a game with a Chinese name somewhat similar to Poker (the similarity that I could pick up being that you had similar collections of cards you could use).

August/September/November Homeschool Miscellany

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.

July Homeschool Miscellany Breakdown into Educationese

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.

April/May/June Homeschool Miscellany

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.

January/February/March Homeschooling Miscellany

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).

October/November/December Homeschooling Miscellany

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.

February Homeschool Miscellany

February was confusing.

I thought I had everything worked out. I was going to show 12yo how to get to and from high school for a couple of weeks, then cut her a key and leave her to it and just continue as normal with the boys.

I didn’t realise a) that this would be tiring and b) that 12yo kept insisting on being accompanied past the two weeks and both her and JJ were having epic freakouts about “what if she gets on the wrong bus” on the way home, as the bus route couldn’t be easy and just reverse, the opposite route goes in a different direction. I had told 12yo how to get back to the main road and where would be safe to cross and which bus numbers to take, but anyway.

December Homeschooling Miscellany

The teenager made the decision some time this month that he needed to be more responsible and started voluntarily practising basic life skills. One involved cooking up a batch of sausages for lunch (plus both boys just felt like sausage sizzle apparently), and while he was about it he decided to experiment with steaming some of them.

The appearance of the steamed sausages wasn’t particularly well received by the 9yo, and it was noted that the flavours and textures differed with the different cooking methods. 13yo also decided he was going to start applying for jobs when we got back to Perth.

November Homeschooling Miscellany

November had to be cruisy after the insanity of October, plus we usually start winding down about now anyway. We stayed home a lot.

We weren’t completely lazy. The boys played with the snap circuits, 13yo mostly building his own. 9yo experimenting with food (in the picture he was doing arty things with strawberries and cream before consuming them), and 11yo was mostly experimenting with and learning about makeup (and spending a lot of money on it).

October Homeschooling Miscellany

October started out with 11yo’s bestie staying for the weekend and them asking if we could wander around Perth for a bit after visiting a store they wanted to browse. 9yo requested my phone to take a couple of photos of things that interested him:

The city has been trying to do more fun and interesting stuff so we tend to find random things whenever we go there. At the time they were celebrating the arrival of spring so there were these random bird cages there, which were apparently great for photoshoots.