And later:
"Where's my book? I want to read it again"
So? I hear you say. What's so special about that?
My daughter is 9.
I've been waiting a long time.
Showing posts with label literacy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label literacy. Show all posts
Wednesday, 6 February 2013
Sunday, 23 January 2011
Friday: Home Things
People often ask what we do for home education; what our weeks are like. 'But how do you make them sit down and do work?' They ask.
Well. Most of the time they don't do 'work'. And they certainly don't spend much time at the table, unless it is to eat, to draw, make models or do some other child-directed activity.
So if you look at my past few blogs you will see a few of the things we did last week. Not every week is like this, but I guess it's fairly representative of how we do home education.
And so to Friday...
Friday is a 'home day'. Usually we tidy up, clean rooms, potter in the garden, bake, go to the library, and generally pursue our own interests. Of course you can label these activities however you like. For us everything we do has value, simply because we have chosen to do it.
Last week, this was our Friday.
Dd playing on her ds (literacy, IT, problem solving skills)
Ds1 writing a storyboard for his latest film (art, literacy, drama, media studies)
Metal detecting in the garden... (archaeology, physical education, history)
Lego modelling (design and technology)
A day of treasures:
Well. Most of the time they don't do 'work'. And they certainly don't spend much time at the table, unless it is to eat, to draw, make models or do some other child-directed activity.
So if you look at my past few blogs you will see a few of the things we did last week. Not every week is like this, but I guess it's fairly representative of how we do home education.
And so to Friday...
Friday is a 'home day'. Usually we tidy up, clean rooms, potter in the garden, bake, go to the library, and generally pursue our own interests. Of course you can label these activities however you like. For us everything we do has value, simply because we have chosen to do it.
Last week, this was our Friday.
Dd playing on her ds (literacy, IT, problem solving skills)
Ds1 writing a storyboard for his latest film (art, literacy, drama, media studies)
Metal detecting in the garden... (archaeology, physical education, history)
Lego modelling (design and technology)Ds2 with his nose in a book (literacy, pure pleasure)
The tidying, undone (hey, what the hell):
A day of treasures:
(Check out my previous posts for Tuesday-Thursday)
Saturday, 27 March 2010
The Incredible Sock-Making Woman and other tales...
Yes! Another pair!
I found this wool on my last wool-hunting expedition (the one that involved the unhygenic chip shop and a wind up toy rat). Only problem with this wool is that the repeat on the colour isn't very frequent, so I had to work really hard to get two socks that looked similar out of one ball of wool. They're very soft though. Shame I can't keep them - sent them to my mum as a belated Mother's Day present. Hopefully they'll fit. If not I'll have to do more knitting...
Other news?
Well dd has been seen in public sporting a very lovely hat. She even had a photo taken of her like this by a local attraction for her annual pass. Oh yes...it's those home educating nutters. You should see what they make their children wear.
Dd's fascination for millipedes and centipedes and other pedes is taking over the house. New tubs with their littlepede houses appear daily. Often with their lids left off. I am extraordinarily tolerant of this sort of thing, having kept various creatures in old Ferrero Rochet tubs under my bed, as a child. However when a dehydrated and rather crunchy centipede stuck to my sock yesterday and I padded around the house it did cross my mind that perhaps this isn't how normal families function.
Dd1 begged to do handwriting practice! (the alternative was a page of maths - God he must really hate maths). So he wrote some beautiful letters in beautiful handwriting...
And then put them to good use...
Don't you just love the eloquence of the English language?
I found this wool on my last wool-hunting expedition (the one that involved the unhygenic chip shop and a wind up toy rat). Only problem with this wool is that the repeat on the colour isn't very frequent, so I had to work really hard to get two socks that looked similar out of one ball of wool. They're very soft though. Shame I can't keep them - sent them to my mum as a belated Mother's Day present. Hopefully they'll fit. If not I'll have to do more knitting...
Other news?
Well dd has been seen in public sporting a very lovely hat. She even had a photo taken of her like this by a local attraction for her annual pass. Oh yes...it's those home educating nutters. You should see what they make their children wear.
Dd's fascination for millipedes and centipedes and other pedes is taking over the house. New tubs with their littlepede houses appear daily. Often with their lids left off. I am extraordinarily tolerant of this sort of thing, having kept various creatures in old Ferrero Rochet tubs under my bed, as a child. However when a dehydrated and rather crunchy centipede stuck to my sock yesterday and I padded around the house it did cross my mind that perhaps this isn't how normal families function.
Dd1 begged to do handwriting practice! (the alternative was a page of maths - God he must really hate maths). So he wrote some beautiful letters in beautiful handwriting...
And then put them to good use...
Don't you just love the eloquence of the English language?
Ds1 and ds2 designed their egg buggies for a home ed competition.
And the kids made puppet theatres out of cereal boxes. Well part-made. Dd was only mildly impressed with my efforts on hers, but she did enjoy the cutting out. Amazing the joy one can get from a pair of scissors and a glue stick.
And the boys were invited to a birthday party involving quad bikes.
Note the 'Oh God Mother put the camera away' look on my eldest's face...
And...so who invited the leopard to breakfast?
I hand made the costume about 7 years ago and NONE of my children have ever wanted to wear it. So what if it gets used to mop up Cheerios - we don't care. Go girl!
And...so who invited the leopard to breakfast?
I hand made the costume about 7 years ago and NONE of my children have ever wanted to wear it. So what if it gets used to mop up Cheerios - we don't care. Go girl!
Friday, 22 January 2010
Business as usual
Ok. Big breath. Open for business as usual.
Today we went to The Roald Dahl Museum on a group trip that I organised. Yes, me, actually organising something that involves, well, organisation. Strange, very strange.
It's only the second time I've organised a Home ed group trip and anyone who knows me knows that organisation and responsibility are two words I avoid in my vocabulary. So it was an experience lol. But overall it went ok. And I've learnt a few things from the day which will help me with the other workshops I've organised for the next few months. [Yeah, I've been foolish enough to organise more. What am I thinking?! Eeek!]. Here are a few photos. I didn't take many pics as the workshop was rather - erhum structured - and I felt a bit self concious getting my camera out. Not that it usually bothers me, but it did today.
Yep that was it. 2 photos. Bit of a poor show for snap-happy me.
But I did get questioned about HE by the workshop leader (ex Headmistress). I answered the questions and - I think - gave her the answers she wanted without slagging off schools. Now I come to think about it, I was really very diplomatic and tactful and mature about it all lol. Must have been because I was wearing my 'grown up' cardigan (ds1 asked if I was going to work when he saw me wearing it). Yay! My 'Grown Up' disguise actually works!
On Wednesday we went to the sailing club. We haven't been for ages so it was good just to get a feel for it again, walk to the woods, let the kids explore.
Ds1 decided in his enthusiasm for survival skills to disguise his head as a large clump of moss. Nah...it's not working...I can still see you.
And dd was tussling with the dogs as usual. This is the child who when asked what she wants to be when she grows up, says 'A chihuaha'.
On Thursday we went skating with other home edders. There were loads of people there this week, choosing skating as an antidote to the cabin fever of a snowbound week I suppose.Thankfully the kids are all fairly independent on the ice so I don't have to go on with them any more. Which means I can sneak off and raid the chocolate machines instead ha ha!
And here are some photos of ds1's Ancient Greek creation:
Today I printed off heaps of stuff from the web on Ancient Greece and some stuff that hopefully will be useful for making lapbooks. Ds1 will be rolling his eyes at me next week {g}.
Sunday, 18 October 2009
A love of reading...
I know the quote below is quite old now, and of course the National Literacy Strategy is being abandoned - in it's current form at least. However, I can't help thinking there is so much truth in these words.
I was an avid reader until I came to take exams in literature; I loved doing those exams, but pulling apart sentences and characters drove out any enjoyment I had of reading. The oppressive feeling of needing to strip down and analyse a book still niggles at the back of my mind 30+ years on. I love books and literature, but the feeling that I should only be reading worthy or current or classic 'works' never goes away, like some stern teacher looking over my shoulder...
Philip Pullman, Oxford Literary Festival in 2003
"What concerns me here is the relationship this sets up between child and book, between children and stories. Stories are written to beguile, to entertain, to amuse, to move, to enchant, to horrify, to delight, to anger, to make us wonder. They are not written so that we can make a fifty word summary of the whole plot, or find five synonyms for the descriptive words. That sort of thing would make you hate reading, and turn away from such a futile activity with disgust. In the words of Ruskin, it’s “slaves’ work, unredeemed.” Those who design this sort of thing seem to have completely forgotten the true purpose of literature, the everyday, humble, generous intention that lies behind every book, every story, every poem: to delight or to console, to help us enjoy life or endure it. That’s the true reason we should be giving books to children. The false reason is to make them analyse, review, comment and so on. But they have to do it – day in, day out, hour after hour, this wretched system nags and pesters and buzzes at them, like a great bluebottle laden with pestilence. And then all the children have to do a test; and that’s when things get worse. "
I was an avid reader until I came to take exams in literature; I loved doing those exams, but pulling apart sentences and characters drove out any enjoyment I had of reading. The oppressive feeling of needing to strip down and analyse a book still niggles at the back of my mind 30+ years on. I love books and literature, but the feeling that I should only be reading worthy or current or classic 'works' never goes away, like some stern teacher looking over my shoulder...
Philip Pullman, Oxford Literary Festival in 2003
"What concerns me here is the relationship this sets up between child and book, between children and stories. Stories are written to beguile, to entertain, to amuse, to move, to enchant, to horrify, to delight, to anger, to make us wonder. They are not written so that we can make a fifty word summary of the whole plot, or find five synonyms for the descriptive words. That sort of thing would make you hate reading, and turn away from such a futile activity with disgust. In the words of Ruskin, it’s “slaves’ work, unredeemed.” Those who design this sort of thing seem to have completely forgotten the true purpose of literature, the everyday, humble, generous intention that lies behind every book, every story, every poem: to delight or to console, to help us enjoy life or endure it. That’s the true reason we should be giving books to children. The false reason is to make them analyse, review, comment and so on. But they have to do it – day in, day out, hour after hour, this wretched system nags and pesters and buzzes at them, like a great bluebottle laden with pestilence. And then all the children have to do a test; and that’s when things get worse. "
Tuesday, 30 June 2009
Literacy and Numeracy Strategies to be abandoned in UK schools
It seems the government has finally realised how it has been squeezing the life out of learning with its Literacy and Numeracy strategies...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8120152.stm
"Key schools policy to be ditched
The government is set to abandon one of its most significant education policies in primary schools in England.
From 2011 schools will no longer have to implement national strategies in literacy and numeracy.
Instead they will be encouraged to work together to find local solutions to the challenges of improving the basic skills of their pupils.
The plans are part of wider reforms to be announced by Schools Secretary Ed Balls next week.
Primary schools in England have been expected to teach English and maths according to centralised guidelines set down by national literacy and numeracy strategies for more than 10 years.
BBC News education correspondent Kim Catcheside says standards improved rapidly at first but have risen much more slowly in recent years.
More from Today programme
Mr Balls will say that from 2011 he is ending the multi-million pound contract with private company Capita to deliver the strategies.
The Guardian reports that money will be redirected to schools to spend on creating networks with other schools and having their own advisers to help improve teaching standards and pupils' performance.
The paper says the changes will be part of a wide-ranging White Paper expected to be published on Tuesday.
Classroom overhaul
Earlier this month, Mr Balls told a teaching conference: "I think the right thing for us to do now is to move away from what has historically been a rather central view of school improvement through national strategies to something which is essentially being commissioned not from the centre but by schools themselves."
Earlier this year former Ofsted chief Sir Jim Rose produced a report for the government on a proposed overhaul of primary schools in England. He recommended that computer technology should be central to the curriculum alongside English, maths and personal skills.
And ministers have agreed to the findings of a group of educationists and headteachers who said formal Sats tests for 10 and 11-year-olds might eventually be replaced by teacher assessments of their pupils."
The Guardian has commented on this news here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/26/labour-schools-national-stra/tegy?commentpage=2
"...Today's Guardian reports that the government is to abandon its national strategies for schools when it announces its white paper on education next week. That means that the much-loathed literacy and numeracy hours in primaries, with their rigid, minute-by-minute dictation of how every teacher must structure and deliver their lesson, will stop being compulsory from 2011. Instead schools will be able to make their own choices about what their children need and how they should teach.
This, coming from a department whose controlling and centralising instincts would have been applauded in a Soviet state, is truly revolutionary. It is a (very) belated recognition that treating children and classrooms as if they were car parts and assembly lines is a strategy that simply doesn't produce skilled, or educated, or motivated pupils.
It's taken the government years to acknowledge this, because for the first few years of the national strategies, after Labour's election in 1997, test results soared. Ministers preened themselves. Everyone else knew it was because teachers were swiftly discovering how to teach children to the test.
Once they'd learned how to do that, nothing improved. The test results at 11 have more or less plateaued in the last six or seven years.
The strategies don't work at any level other than the most superficial.
Teachers feel helpless when they are in front of classes that aren't grasping the points at the speed the national timetable lays down. There is no flexibility. The national plan compels a teacher to move on, no matter how many children are being left behind. Frantic booster classes at ages seven and 11 teach children the short-term tricks they must know to get them through Sats tests.
Even those who can keep up find the lessons stultifying. Some years ago English teachers in secondaries started reporting that 11-year-old children were arriving saying they hated the subject. For years they'd been exposed to passages by brilliant writers like Michael Morpurgo or Philip Pullman, but not in order to be enraptured by their stories or taken into another world by their prose. No, it was in order to analyse their paragraphs and identify how many adjectives and nouns they had used.
It's hard to know what has finally forced this change. Perhaps it's the shaming results of the department's latest wheeze; the piloting of new single-level tests in English and maths to replace the Sats at 11.
These are supposed to be taken – like music exams – when a child is ready.
What the pilots have revealed is that 14-year-olds are regularly scoring much lower in the tests than 11-year-olds.
There's only one explanation for this, which is that children were never really understanding their subject in the first place; they were just being crammed, and a few years on, they've forgotten how to do it.
Should we be pleased that the government has finally recognised this truth?
I don't think so. I think the appropriate reaction is fury about the wasted years."
Some of the comments under this Guardian article are sad, as well as revealing. One person comments:
"This morning, my glee at the demise of the strategies was short lived. There can be no party for the lost years. My own children have endured these trite,unimaginative lessons, their individuality and imagination stifled, their love of aforementioned Morpurgo and Pullman only present because of having parents who were insistent that they should pick up a book to read and enjoy and not ascertain and scrutinize the sentence level and structure.
As a teacher, I was disenfranchised, disempowered, constantly speeding up or rather "pacing" my lessons to get through the objectives, irrespective of the needs of the children in my charge. Countless pieces of unfinished work or unread literature that just got washed away by the need to move onto the nextset of CVCs or the learning of "where, wear, ware".
Even now, I get palpatations at the thought, and for those contributers who say why didn't teachers just do what they thought was right, well, how could we? With didactic headteachers breathing down our necks and the impending requirements of an Ofsted regime fixated on test results, we were stymied."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8120152.stm
"Key schools policy to be ditched
The government is set to abandon one of its most significant education policies in primary schools in England.
From 2011 schools will no longer have to implement national strategies in literacy and numeracy.
Instead they will be encouraged to work together to find local solutions to the challenges of improving the basic skills of their pupils.
The plans are part of wider reforms to be announced by Schools Secretary Ed Balls next week.
Primary schools in England have been expected to teach English and maths according to centralised guidelines set down by national literacy and numeracy strategies for more than 10 years.
BBC News education correspondent Kim Catcheside says standards improved rapidly at first but have risen much more slowly in recent years.
More from Today programme
Mr Balls will say that from 2011 he is ending the multi-million pound contract with private company Capita to deliver the strategies.
The Guardian reports that money will be redirected to schools to spend on creating networks with other schools and having their own advisers to help improve teaching standards and pupils' performance.
The paper says the changes will be part of a wide-ranging White Paper expected to be published on Tuesday.
Classroom overhaul
Earlier this month, Mr Balls told a teaching conference: "I think the right thing for us to do now is to move away from what has historically been a rather central view of school improvement through national strategies to something which is essentially being commissioned not from the centre but by schools themselves."
Earlier this year former Ofsted chief Sir Jim Rose produced a report for the government on a proposed overhaul of primary schools in England. He recommended that computer technology should be central to the curriculum alongside English, maths and personal skills.
And ministers have agreed to the findings of a group of educationists and headteachers who said formal Sats tests for 10 and 11-year-olds might eventually be replaced by teacher assessments of their pupils."
The Guardian has commented on this news here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/26/labour-schools-national-stra/tegy?commentpage=2
"...Today's Guardian reports that the government is to abandon its national strategies for schools when it announces its white paper on education next week. That means that the much-loathed literacy and numeracy hours in primaries, with their rigid, minute-by-minute dictation of how every teacher must structure and deliver their lesson, will stop being compulsory from 2011. Instead schools will be able to make their own choices about what their children need and how they should teach.
This, coming from a department whose controlling and centralising instincts would have been applauded in a Soviet state, is truly revolutionary. It is a (very) belated recognition that treating children and classrooms as if they were car parts and assembly lines is a strategy that simply doesn't produce skilled, or educated, or motivated pupils.
It's taken the government years to acknowledge this, because for the first few years of the national strategies, after Labour's election in 1997, test results soared. Ministers preened themselves. Everyone else knew it was because teachers were swiftly discovering how to teach children to the test.
Once they'd learned how to do that, nothing improved. The test results at 11 have more or less plateaued in the last six or seven years.
The strategies don't work at any level other than the most superficial.
Teachers feel helpless when they are in front of classes that aren't grasping the points at the speed the national timetable lays down. There is no flexibility. The national plan compels a teacher to move on, no matter how many children are being left behind. Frantic booster classes at ages seven and 11 teach children the short-term tricks they must know to get them through Sats tests.
Even those who can keep up find the lessons stultifying. Some years ago English teachers in secondaries started reporting that 11-year-old children were arriving saying they hated the subject. For years they'd been exposed to passages by brilliant writers like Michael Morpurgo or Philip Pullman, but not in order to be enraptured by their stories or taken into another world by their prose. No, it was in order to analyse their paragraphs and identify how many adjectives and nouns they had used.
It's hard to know what has finally forced this change. Perhaps it's the shaming results of the department's latest wheeze; the piloting of new single-level tests in English and maths to replace the Sats at 11.
These are supposed to be taken – like music exams – when a child is ready.
What the pilots have revealed is that 14-year-olds are regularly scoring much lower in the tests than 11-year-olds.
There's only one explanation for this, which is that children were never really understanding their subject in the first place; they were just being crammed, and a few years on, they've forgotten how to do it.
Should we be pleased that the government has finally recognised this truth?
I don't think so. I think the appropriate reaction is fury about the wasted years."
Some of the comments under this Guardian article are sad, as well as revealing. One person comments:
"This morning, my glee at the demise of the strategies was short lived. There can be no party for the lost years. My own children have endured these trite,unimaginative lessons, their individuality and imagination stifled, their love of aforementioned Morpurgo and Pullman only present because of having parents who were insistent that they should pick up a book to read and enjoy and not ascertain and scrutinize the sentence level and structure.
As a teacher, I was disenfranchised, disempowered, constantly speeding up or rather "pacing" my lessons to get through the objectives, irrespective of the needs of the children in my charge. Countless pieces of unfinished work or unread literature that just got washed away by the need to move onto the nextset of CVCs or the learning of "where, wear, ware".
Even now, I get palpatations at the thought, and for those contributers who say why didn't teachers just do what they thought was right, well, how could we? With didactic headteachers breathing down our necks and the impending requirements of an Ofsted regime fixated on test results, we were stymied."
Thursday, 19 February 2009
'How secondary schools stop kids being creative...'
This little article makes interesting - though not surprising - reading. I expect a reasonably intelligent person would find similar creativity-crushing influences in a primary school if they knew what they were looking for.
About 4 years ago I read an article by an author/researcher who believed that the restriction on weapon/hero/adventure play in nurseries and schools was stifling boys' creativity. When I discussed it with someone at the time, they thought it was a total overexaggeration. I'm not so sure; I remember the time when my nearly-5 year old ds1 decided to stop drawing aeroplanes after one of the private nursery staff told him he mustn't draw guns on it. Considering he'd barely lifted a writing implement until a few months previous, it was such a frustratingly annoying thing and my heart went out to my little boy.
Anyway, back to the article in the blog title...I've snipped a bit of the original, to give the gist of it:
'How secondary schools stop kids, especially boys, being creative - by a top children's author' The Times Online 9 Febhttp://timesonline.typepad.com/schoolgate/2009/02/how-secondary-s.html
"To be creative, you have to be wrong most of the time. Unfortunately, being wrong doesn’t go down very well at school. In fact, I think creativity is being educated out of kids when they get into Secondary School, and it’s a big problem....
...I often get the impression that teachers are drawn to the ideas from their girl pupils, whereas the imaginative world of the boys seems mysterious – sometimes even dangerous. I can sympathise with teachers who are afraid to be seen to be encouraging violent thoughts. But most boys’ imaginations run most quickly to two extremes: the violent and the absurd. I happen to think that’s exciting, but teachers seem to want to foster creativity within certain ‘safe’ parameters. Creativity is not safe.
I would love to see, in the context of an English lesson, the classroom transformed into an environment which rewards wacky, crazy-stupid and yes, even sometimes violent ideas. Until it is, boys’ creativity will continue to be ‘educated’ out of them at the upper end of Primary Schools and the lower end of Secondary Schools. And they will continue to give up on reading..."
About 4 years ago I read an article by an author/researcher who believed that the restriction on weapon/hero/adventure play in nurseries and schools was stifling boys' creativity. When I discussed it with someone at the time, they thought it was a total overexaggeration. I'm not so sure; I remember the time when my nearly-5 year old ds1 decided to stop drawing aeroplanes after one of the private nursery staff told him he mustn't draw guns on it. Considering he'd barely lifted a writing implement until a few months previous, it was such a frustratingly annoying thing and my heart went out to my little boy.
Anyway, back to the article in the blog title...I've snipped a bit of the original, to give the gist of it:
'How secondary schools stop kids, especially boys, being creative - by a top children's author' The Times Online 9 Febhttp://timesonline.typepad.com/schoolgate/2009/02/how-secondary-s.html
"To be creative, you have to be wrong most of the time. Unfortunately, being wrong doesn’t go down very well at school. In fact, I think creativity is being educated out of kids when they get into Secondary School, and it’s a big problem....
...I often get the impression that teachers are drawn to the ideas from their girl pupils, whereas the imaginative world of the boys seems mysterious – sometimes even dangerous. I can sympathise with teachers who are afraid to be seen to be encouraging violent thoughts. But most boys’ imaginations run most quickly to two extremes: the violent and the absurd. I happen to think that’s exciting, but teachers seem to want to foster creativity within certain ‘safe’ parameters. Creativity is not safe.
I would love to see, in the context of an English lesson, the classroom transformed into an environment which rewards wacky, crazy-stupid and yes, even sometimes violent ideas. Until it is, boys’ creativity will continue to be ‘educated’ out of them at the upper end of Primary Schools and the lower end of Secondary Schools. And they will continue to give up on reading..."
Sunday, 7 September 2008
The boys are READING!!!
I put a video on before the kids went to bed, turned round and what did I see..?
At last I'm in that wonderful position of being able to say: 'Hey, get your nose out of that book!' (but of course I didn't).
I feel like cracking open the champagne (except that I don't much like it). My boys are reading! Not just reading, but reading voluntarily...willingly...and even choosing to read rather than watch a video. Whooo hooo! At last, reassurance that autonomous education has really worked for us, for them.
[So, sorry boys, but I just had to take a photo of the moment]
And here's a photo of dd1, drawing hearts. They did look rather like giant worms (she wasn't that offended when I pointed it out), but it was still sweet of her to draw them. It makes a change from pussy cats and doggies, which are her usual subject.
My two boys were reading!
At last I'm in that wonderful position of being able to say: 'Hey, get your nose out of that book!' (but of course I didn't).
I feel like cracking open the champagne (except that I don't much like it). My boys are reading! Not just reading, but reading voluntarily...willingly...and even choosing to read rather than watch a video. Whooo hooo! At last, reassurance that autonomous education has really worked for us, for them.
[So, sorry boys, but I just had to take a photo of the moment]
And here's a photo of dd1, drawing hearts. They did look rather like giant worms (she wasn't that offended when I pointed it out), but it was still sweet of her to draw them. It makes a change from pussy cats and doggies, which are her usual subject.
Friday, 29 August 2008
'Give Children books, not SATs'
Two posts in one day?
Saw this link on an email list and thought I'd refer to it here.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/schools/michael-rosen-give-children-books-not-sats-910225.html
Michael Rosen: 'Give children books, not SATs'
'...."Testing does something to children, something to teachers, something to parents, something to the whole conversation about education," he says. His everyday speech, you notice, has the same lively stream of consciousness as his poetry.
But by far his biggest concern is what testing has done to his greatest love: books. Literacy standards at 14 fell this year, according to Key Stage 3 tests. Rosen is currently tub-thumping on behalf of the National Year of Reading, a campaign to celebrate the written word, and has written a poem for the cause – printed exclusively today . What he wants above all is to re-inject a sense of enthusiasm into the study of literature in schools. Love books, he says, and school will be a cinch; over-test children, sterilise the English language, and you only make it harder...'
Here's the poem. It's lost some of the formatting when I cut and pasted it, so I've tried to restore it a bit. Sorry Michael, probably made a pig's ear out of it...
'Words Are Us', by Michael Rosen
In the beginning was the word
And the word is ours:
The names of places
The names of flowers
The names of names
Words are ours
Page-turners
For early learners
How to boil an egg
Or mend a leg
Words are ours
Wall charts
Love hearts
Sports reports
Short retorts
Jam jar labels
Timetables
Words are ours
Following the instructions
For furniture constructions
Ancient mythologies
Online anthologies
Who she wrote for
Who to vote for
Joke collections
Results of elections
Words are ours
The tale's got you gripped
Have you learned your script?
The method of an experiment
Ingredients for merriment
W8n 4ur txt
Re: whts nxt
Print media
Wikipedia
Words are ours
Subtitles on TV
Details on your CV
Book of great speeches
Guide to the best beaches
Looking for chapters
on velociraptors
Words are ours
The mystery of history
The history of mystery
The views of news
The news of views
Words to explain
the words for pain
Doing geography
Autobiography
What to do in payphones
Goodbyes on gravestones
Words are ours.
www.michaelrosen.co.uk
Saw this link on an email list and thought I'd refer to it here.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/schools/michael-rosen-give-children-books-not-sats-910225.html
Michael Rosen: 'Give children books, not SATs'
'...."Testing does something to children, something to teachers, something to parents, something to the whole conversation about education," he says. His everyday speech, you notice, has the same lively stream of consciousness as his poetry.
But by far his biggest concern is what testing has done to his greatest love: books. Literacy standards at 14 fell this year, according to Key Stage 3 tests. Rosen is currently tub-thumping on behalf of the National Year of Reading, a campaign to celebrate the written word, and has written a poem for the cause – printed exclusively today . What he wants above all is to re-inject a sense of enthusiasm into the study of literature in schools. Love books, he says, and school will be a cinch; over-test children, sterilise the English language, and you only make it harder...'
Here's the poem. It's lost some of the formatting when I cut and pasted it, so I've tried to restore it a bit. Sorry Michael, probably made a pig's ear out of it...
'Words Are Us', by Michael Rosen
In the beginning was the word
And the word is ours:
The names of places
The names of flowers
The names of names
Words are ours
Page-turners
For early learners
How to boil an egg
Or mend a leg
Words are ours
Wall charts
Love hearts
Sports reports
Short retorts
Jam jar labels
Timetables
Words are ours
Following the instructions
For furniture constructions
Ancient mythologies
Online anthologies
Who she wrote for
Who to vote for
Joke collections
Results of elections
Words are ours
The tale's got you gripped
Have you learned your script?
The method of an experiment
Ingredients for merriment
W8n 4ur txt
Re: whts nxt
Print media
Wikipedia
Words are ours
Subtitles on TV
Details on your CV
Book of great speeches
Guide to the best beaches
Looking for chapters
on velociraptors
Words are ours
The mystery of history
The history of mystery
The views of news
The news of views
Words to explain
the words for pain
Doing geography
Autobiography
What to do in payphones
Goodbyes on gravestones
Words are ours.
www.michaelrosen.co.uk
Tuesday, 12 August 2008
The big fat chrysallis, a broken cooker and The Vikings
Well, it seems a while since I've had a chance to post on the blog, so I guess we must have been busy.
We spent last weekend away on the south coast visiting relatives. It was rather windy for spending alot of time on the beach, but we did some kite flying and the kids managed to collect half the beach in some plastic bags (cos we need more shells, don't we?). On the Sunday we went to a village fair with vintage vehicles and stalls.
Can't resist a bargain! A huge tray of geraniums for £1. Haven't got a clue where I'm going to put them, but hey, still a bargain lol. Nice armoured personel carrier too.
The boys look interested at things with wheels - even better, a thing with wheels AND weapons.
Chocolate muffins!!
I catch ds1 reading!! It feels like the whole of my home ed journey has been waiting for this moment...
So, he's taken a liking to a Calvin and Hobbes cartoon book and over the weekend finished it off.Now I just have to resist the urge to log on to Amazon and buy every single Calvin and Hobbes book ever published.
We came back home on Tuesday, and on Wednesday morning I lashed myself into a frenzy of baking, trying out a new bread recipe and making some apple scone too. Went to light the oven only to find it wasn't working! Grrr... But...then I realised this was a fantastic opportunity, the opportunity to buy a nice new big shiny cooker! Having never had a new cooker (all have been secondhand), and having previously patched up/repaired/made do with the various quirky cookers over the years, I think perhaps it's time to invest in a new one.
So, I spent Wednesday afternoon and a couple of hours on Thursday dragging the kids around the main stores and looking at cookers. And yes, they were thrilled...Spent the rest of Thursday hunting on the internet for yet more cookers, while trying to deal with kids' interruptions every few minutes. Still, the thrill of the chase is all part of the shopping experience...
By the way, it turns out that the Hawkmoth caterpillar (see previous post) that we adopted hasn't died. Instead, it's turned into a huge brown chrysallis! If it wasn't so huge it might actually be quite pretty. I'm relieved that we didn't actually kill it off and that it may eventually hatch out into large moth. I just need to check every day to see how it's doing.
I started doing some stuff about the Vikings with the kids today, after ds1 had asked to do some more structured things. We'd had a discussion about what he might like to do and I suggested the Vikings might be interesting. I had lots of hands-on/interactive sheets for the kids and some books already so we were ready to start up, but it was all met with some resistance by ds2, and ds1 was so easily distracted it was difficult to get going (not helped by dd1's constant interruptions). Ds1 ended up lighting magnifying glass fires while I was trying to get him enthusiastic about colouring pictures of Vikings! Reminds me of previous attempts at any sort of structured or 'table' work..lol..which is why we ended up choosing a mostly autonomous path. I don't know how other families manage to do structured work with more than one child. Perhaps they spend their whole day chasing them around and then when they catch up with them they staple them to the table lol! I guess we'll see how it goes.
Tuesday, 22 July 2008
ARe you My MUMMY?
I think perhaps my children have been watching too much tv.
When my 4 year old is cheerfully reenacting some of the scariest scenes from the latest Dr Who series, I should probably be taking a good look at my parenting, or lack of it :) I think it's been a gradual progression, a slow slipping into permissiveness that has come with warmer weather. Yes, that's it, blame it on Summer...
Only a few months ago I was unhappy with the boys watching Dr Who, feeling it to be a bit too creepy for them to watch before bedtime. Dh however had, on the sly, been letting them watch Dr Who while I was out at work. Now it seems that dd1 has been watching it too. Hence the reenactment seen in the video below. For those of you not familiar with this episode of Dr Who, it's the one with the creepy people in gas masks that have grown onto their faces, who wander around saying 'Are you my mummy?'
Are you my mummy?
Reenacting an episode of Dr Who. Well, at least it shows their creativity and imagination! (And yes, that is a Listerine box)
Up in the apple tree (trying to get away from creepy dd1!)
Ok, ok, I'm your Mummy. Now go away, you're scaring me!
Not that my kids get creeped out by anything on tv/DVD it seems. Most of the things that would have made me pee my pants as a kid get calmly absorbed by them without any apparent consequences! Is this a symptom of modern society or am I just a bit of a woose? Probably the latter. I can't even watch a black-and-white 'B' movie without getting edgy and I'm always wary of seeing new films at the cinema; best to get a review from a friend first before I scare myself to death. Perhaps I should just stick to PG films!!
As I'm typing this blog entry the kids are watching 'Dr Who Confidential' that I recorded last night for them. Dr Who Confidential shows how a particular episode, usually the one shown immediately before, is made. I think the kids are interested in how the programme - and programmes in general - are made. Perhaps that's why these things aren't so frightening for them: they have a good realisation of what's fictional and what's not, how these things are created in a studio and how this translates to the screen.
Ds1 in particular is quite interested in film making and animation. He's signed up for another animation workshop in a week or so's time - using clay/plasticine to make models. It's part of an annual film and animation week that we have locally.
Took the kids to the library this afternoon. Picked up one of their 'let's persuade kids to read over Summer' schemes. Obviously it's not called that, it's called something more catchy like 'Team Read' and comes with a sporty/footbally poster to put your stickers on. Of course, it's pretty obvious to me that it's biased towards boys - the assumption being that boys don't read so much and need more encouragement. So, what is it about these do-goody government people that they assume that all boys are interested in sport/football? I'm sure if they actually did some research they'd find that their target group - i.e. the kids, predominantly boys, who aren't deemed to be reading enough or early enough - like a whole range of different things, not just blooming football!!!.
Anyway, the gist of the scheme is that the kids are encouraged to get stickers for each 2 books (of their choice) that they read. My kids have never been that interested in previous years - they're not really star chart /sticker reward sort of kids - and I haven't made them do it, cos I think it's a bit lame. They're bright enough to realise it's just a trick - a very transparent one - to get kids to read books. Still, I think ds2 might be interested this time and this might motivate ds1 to do the same, so I got packs for all of them just in case they are overtaken with a sudden urge to read books for stickers. I'm sure there'll be a few parents with school kids who'll be virtually ramming the books down their kids' throats just to get them to read over the holidays and get their stickers. I suppose I would have done the same 4 or 5 years ago too. Ah the wisdom of experience, especially home education experience...
Sunday, 18 May 2008
Cakes, the entrepreneur and the cam wheel
Today dd1 and ds2 finally got to make cakes. They've been nagging me for weeks to make cakes. I'm not much of a keen cook anyway, but for me cooking and kids just doesn't work especially 3 boisterous kids in a tiny kitchen! The people who say that cooking with kids is fun, obviously don't have kids - or have the patience of a saint and cleaners to clean up the mess afterwards! Anyway I confess that it wasn't me who finally conceded to their demands - it was their aunt who volunteered for cake-making duties (don't suppose she'll be doing that again in a hurry!). I took the cowardly approach, went and 'hid' in the garden, planting some beans and trying to get my wonky old bunch of bean poles to make some kind of a line.
Pussy cat cakes!
Some of the cake mix got into the oven,
but there seemed to be alot on the table and around faces!
Ds1 did some shopping today as he's starting up his tuck shop again. I'm sure all the other home ed parents will be cursing us as he turns up at the activities with his stash of chocolate bars, crisps, lollies and sweets to sell to their kids. However, despite my misgivings about feeding the home ed community's kids with junk food, it does have a lot of educational value. For ds1 this means maths, English, business skills, all rolled into something he actually gets a buzz out of doing.
There he was, going round Tescos, reading labels, adding up what was in the trolley, working out what products were cheapest, what would sell best, how much profit he could make. I leant him the money for his stock today, but he's going to pay me back from his 'business' account next week.
When we got home he was keen to get everything out and we went through the receipt with a calculator while he did division to work out how much each individual item would cost. [All those times I've tried to explain division to him with no success and there he was understanding it perfectly - there's alot to be said for learning with a purpose, in context, when it's relevant and appropriate to your needs!] He then decided how much to charge for each item, boxed them all up, wrote price labels for the boxes and stored them in the cool box. Then next he'll probably need to write out a price list to display for his customers. Perhaps we should have used this for his Blue Peter badge instead (though I'm sure Blue Peter are far too politically correct to encourage children to sell junk food to other children!)
Opening up the packages
Writing price stickers
In the meantime, ds2 was doing technical drawings today. I'm not entirely sure whether they are inventions or drawings of our car (one of them had a 'Cam wheel' labelled), but I can't help but be impressed by his enthusiasm. A little help with the boys' handwriting and spelling wouldn't go amiss perhaps (!) - I'm yet to find out how this can be achieved through autonomous education - but at least they have a passion to learn, design, invent and create.
(For some reason I can't get these photo to display the right way around)Friday, 1 February 2008
Learning all the time...
John Holt's book 'Learning all the time' arrived in the post today, and as if to reaffirm some of its content my children have been happily learning all day.
At least I assume they are learning. It's a difficult thing to quantify, but just from observing them (as discretely as I can) I can almost watch the cogs turning, each time leading to a new discovery or a new question.
dd1 (4) today discovered some magnetic letters and shapes that I'd acquired from our local 'Swap Shop'. They'd been in the footwell of our car for 3 weeks, first in a box with a lid, then in the box as the box lid got stood on(!), and then finally, when the box was used first as an impromtu plate and then a notebook, they just got left strewn across the footwell. Feeling diligent today (and aware of the rapidly deteriorating state of the inside of my car) I scooped them up into a perfumed 'nappy sack' and brought them indoors.
Dd1 showed some interest, so I left her with them, not sure exactly what she wanted them for. She picked out a few and quickly found something to stick them on - the metal cupboard door under our kitchen sink. I don't know if I've ever 'taught' her anything about magnets and magnetic things, but I guess she'd just absorbed the information somehow. With the bag (and another box of magnetic letters that we found) she started to make a tower up the cupboard of the magnetic animals/objects, swapping them around. First it was the house on top of the sheep on top of the ....and so on. She talked all the time, not for my benefit, just as if to explain to herself what she was doing and why. Next she made a tower up the cupboard door of the magnetic letters. Sometimes she stopped and asked me what a particular letter was (I was in the kitchen, making lunch). She was particularly fascinated with the 'i' and the 'j' letters because they had joining plastic between the 'dot' and the 'stick' part of the letter.
'Hmm...' she said about the letter j,'this one is the same, but it's got a curly bit on it'.
I said 'yes that's 'j' for jump'. We thought a little more about other words that began with 'j'. She suggested a word.' Yes, jug that's a good word.'
'No, not jug she replied junk' . I had misheard her.
'Ah like junkbot', I said. Junkbot is the name of a game on the Lego website, where the player has to move bricks to assist the 'junkbot' in completing his task. It's a popular game with her brothers.
'Yes, but it's not junkbox, not box like a box', she emphasised. 'It's bot. Junkbot.'
'That's right, Junkbot. Because it's a robot that carries junk', I said.
We laughed as at that moment the dog sneaked in and stole one of the letters. Look I said, ' he's stolen the letter that begins his name. 'He's got j for Jack. What a clever dog'.
It was true. I took the 'j' from his mouth and put it back in the box.
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