Though I believe that learning happens in family life, that we don’t only learn from books and pre-planned lessons it is encouraging when I reflect back on a week and can actually see what has been productive learning time. Often a week is a blur though and I cannot think what we possibly did for one day, let alone a week! Glancing back over my diary helps but so too does downloading my camera and looking at the photos. Here are two photos of two learning opportunities my kids have had in the last few weeks.
As I mentioned in my newsletter last week Daniel had time with a song writer and in one hour they had taken words Daniel had written and turned it into a song – not only that but he recorded it onto a CD! It was a great opportunity for Daniel to see the song writing process and to see technology at work. Jess is working at getting the music posted on his blog.
Nomi hasn’t been as consistent with drawing/art lately but the other day she sat down
and drew a picture of our friends. (I’m sure you’ll recognise them if you know them!)
We tried to keep this week a bit free-er from outside commitments. It was nice – the girls wrote a few letters to pen-pals, they put in a bit extra piano practice, listened to audio stories and read books. Daniel played outside in the cubby and built a castle from his Lego.
Wednesday we had the girls piano lessons. The day marked 12 months of having the same piano teacher (a record!) so we celebrated with a special morning tea muffins made by Nomi. Jess took on an extra project with Mainly Music wrapping Easter gifts which was done at the last minute because I forgot to buy wrapping paper!
Today Nomi helped me out by hemming a friends pair of trousers. Both girls helped me with the grocery shopping (we are shopping fortnightly now so it is a bit bigger shop). We then went to the library which is a great place of incidental learning – search engines, key words, respect of people and rules etc. Daniel spent today with Peter on the farm which included a driving lesson in our farm run-about.
Then there are all those conversations that happen as we come and go. I know that we’ve talked about politics, blogging ethics and dealing with online conflict. We had a big discussion on being sensitive to other people’s emotions – showing empathy.
And we have been reading about the death and resurrection of Jesus. This year we’ve used the devotion that came with the Resurrection Eggs – it has been very good, giving us lots of opportunity to reflect on our own lives and heart.
So though we may have or may not have done enough math, science and history – we certainly have been learning.
