So much to do, so little time

Argh! I feel so overwhelmed at the moment. I am currently finishing off a course I started some time ago, and I have 4 weeks to complete a few assignments for it. There is also all the materials I want to make for our homeschool, the house to sort out, the garden to prepare for the better weather... More recently I have felt the real need to be more creative, to bring art and crafts into our home but also I need a creative outlet that is for me and not for the children. I also need to try to supplement our income so that we have a little extra put by for times when we might need it too.

At the moment, my days consist of getting up at 6.15am, going for a swim, coming home for breakfast, then get ready for our day, do school or whatever we have to do for the day, and some afternoons I get to sit down to try to catch up on emails etc, but often I don't, then Daddy comes home, we have dinner, he baths and gets the children ready for bed while I try to get everything I need to get done without interruption done in 45 minutes, then I go upstairs and sit in bed trying to do more stuff. I have been really exhausted since Bear was born, and I tend to go to bed real early! I remember with Addie though, that there was a time we decided to go back downstairs after she went to bed, and our productivity rose greatly...

So, I have been giving a lot of mental effort into trying to work out how everything can work out, and we also get a better work/life balance as well, especially with the summer coming!


I need to make some small changes, some medium size changes, and some what some may consider to be big changes.

We need to spend the next week leading up to Easter getting the house in order. That is a big thing. The house is not in order, and it needs to be. With order comes tranquility and more time too. Less time needed to straighten things up, more time to do other things. I have almost done one room, the room we call the family room - it was intended to be a quiet room where we could go as a family, hence the name, but has been developed into the room we start our school day in, we sing, we read, we say prayers, we learn a little. I have a library of reference books in there, and our readers. I have now also put our language materials in there (not all of them, but just the ones we will need shortly). And our geography materials, and the Pink Tower - all the items that need to be kept from Bear's reach at the moment! This room is definitely still a work in progress in terms of the materials that need to go in there, but is the most sorted room at the moment. And I love sitting in there!

We need a strict timetable I think, to stick to until we are in a rhythm that can be sustained and have us where we want to be. I need to be stricter with myself and try to find some ways to increase my energy. I need to go back downstairs once the children have gone to bed (oh but I love getting into my bed, so this will be a real struggle!).

I need to get my assignments out of the way asap, and then get on with making some of the materials I want to make. There are quite a few, and I think I need to schedule time into my week to make these, so I know I will make progress on them each week, because at the moment I feel I can't do them with my assignments hanging over me, which I can't concentrate on because the house needs sorting!

And then, in May, I am launching my new business! I am so excited, I want to launch it now, but I just can't. I have to do all things in order, and using common sense that right now I cannot do it, but once my course is over, and I have some more materials made, I can do it. And I am so excited!

Do you want to know what it is? Maybe I will leave that for another post (and leave you all guessing!).,. but let's just say that it combines my need for a creative outlet, my love of nature, and hopefully will provide me with not only a hobby that I feel I need, but also a means of earning that additional income that I feel we need to have at the moment...

Must get back to the assignments now, but I just wanted to say that sometimes life just really gets on top of us, we have so many things we need to do and sometimes we just need to take a day or two out to plan and to decide what can and can't be done, and in what timeframe, to make us feel more empowered and certain about the future. Otherwise we can get bogged down and keep trying to wade against the tide and getting nowhere fast.

The purpose of my blog

I have been thinking recently what the value of me blogging is, to others. There are so many amazing blogs out there that are written for other people. By that I mean, for example in Montessori and other methods of education/homeschooling there are excellent bloggers who blog to help others to do what they are doing. They publish printables, how to videos, a post on a new topic or subject they teach every day. 

This blog is different at the moment I think. I am writing my experiences, and I suppose I am writing them for an audience. I can see from the stats that a few people have my blog on a feedly list, so when I publish a new post, they get notified. Great! I am writing, not with any plan or schedule (which is what a 'good' blogger would possibly do maybe) but with things that come into my head on a particular day, so it is a bit random. It is, however, a little spotlight into our lives as home educators, some of our struggles, some of our triumphs, some of how we are doing things and what it looks like in practice. In the future, there may be printables, but to be honest there are so many amazing people out there offering printables, I use them rather than making my own - it takes less time! And time is something I don't seem to be able to have much of at all (I have no idea how they have more time than I do in the day!)... 

Anyway, thanks for following, thanks for reading.. I will continue to do what I am doing when I can. March has been a good month for blogging! 59 posts ever done on this blog, and 21 of them in March so far! I am enjoying it and long may it continue. 

A tiny ray of hope!

Those of you who have been following my blog (and my facebook ramblings!) will know that having a 15-month old around while I am trying to present to Addie has been quite a challenge! Bear wants to be involved in everything, touch everything, do everything that Addie is doing. She can be really in to doing something (rarely on her own, but there are moments of individual work), and he will just come in like a tornado and leave devastation in his wake... !

Some times, Daddy will take Bear to work with him, so we can really get in to some work, but he can't do that every day, and the struggles I have been having have really made me question whether or not I can do this home education thing...

However, today there was a tiny ray of hope.

I sat down with Addie to present Open Ended Distance Matching with the Knobbed Cylinders, which she absolutely loved, and along comes Bear... And he absolutely loved it too! Neither of them did the activity 100% as it is written in the album, but there was so much sensorial learning going on! Actually, Bear really surprised me once again with these. Although it is really a work for a 3-year old, he is really good at matching the cylinders to their holes (except the one where it is only the height of the cylinders that changes). He puts them back with no hesitation and very little error. And actually, it was not a disruption this time, it was great to see them working together. OK, so Bear did not get the cylinder that was requested, he went and got another one (and placed it, first time in the correct hole regardless of which cylinder it was), but Addie was really good at selecting the correct cylinders too, and we went through all of the cylinders, doing both the Open-Ended and Closed-Ended presentations because they loved this game! I was pleasantly surprised and the tiniest ray of hope started to come through... I managed to capture some of this on camera, but I have realised as I added the photos that I actually don't have any of the main work they did, just that difficult 4th block and also the last block we did when we started to lose interest...!

Bear is really good at realising when he has made a mistake - he recognised that the cylinder he did put in was in the wrong hole, and corrected himself - something I have only noticed from looking at these pictures as I write this post!

Addie did some more work on her lifecycles today... Here she is getting her Insect Lore Life Cycle Stages Frog to kiss 'his picture' on the Tadpole to Frog (Lifecycles) book (I wasn't going to correct her that the frog is a lady frog!)... 

And then Bear and I did some more work together - Rolling a Work Mat and putting it away! So cute! (and after that we got it out again and looked at the Children Around the World pictures together!)

Today was a good day. Tomorrow will be different. Actually we are going to watch the solar eclipse, hopefully at the beach! Onwards and upwards with a tiny ray of hope...

Dispelling the Home Ed Myths: What do you do all day?

A lot of people think that home educated children spend 6 hours a day or so sat at a desk at home doing school work. This is a myth. Here is an incomplete list of the things going on in the home ed community near us for the last week and over the next couple of weeks. It is incomplete because it is only what is included in facebook groups, but there are lots more things going on that are not put on facebook!

Here is an idea of what is going on:

Parkour group
Badminton
Mini golf
Open space meet ups at different places
Soft play centre meet up
Trampolining
Breakfast at the beach to watch the solar eclipse
Social swim
Junior & Senior archery groups
Library meet up
Farm visit
Drama group
Ice skating
Visit to an activity centre
Acro
Craft groups
Forest school
Workshop on postage stamps
Musical theatre classes
Book club
Meditation
Bikeability
French Club
Storytelling
CSI Forensic Science Whodunnit
Home Ed Network gathering
Recycling centre visit
Farm to fork visit at Tesco
Wood carving classes
Playdates
Magna Carta Themed Art Workshop
Trip to Marwell Zoo (mega trip of 230 approx home educated children)
Horseriding
Ballet session
Home ed camps

Fantastic! A lot of these are weekly activities, and there are far too many to go to all of them! But what an amazing range of opportunities available to home educated children who would not get these opportunities if they were in school! Obviously Addie and Bear are a little young for a lot of these at the moment, but we did go to a farm yesterday, and we are going to the beach tomorrow for the eclipse...

Hopefully that helps to dispel a myth...

Build it, and it will come

I couldn't really think of a great title for this post, but I think this sums up a little of what I wanted to get across.

One of the main downfalls, in my opinion, of Montessori home education or homeschooling is the lack of other children in the learning community. This is a big thing in Montessori, where children learn in multi-age communities, and often learn skills from observing or being taught by their classmates. At home, this is a lot less possible, and while I have toyed with the idea of opening a co-op in my home (but found that it would probably be too overwhelming as I would possibly become the 'teacher' rather than just another co-op parent) this lack of community has been something that I have been quite sad about at times.

For Addie, in particular, I have felt this could be an issue. As the oldest, she has no older children to observe and learn from. And she is a great observer. One thing that struck me today was that she will probably have to learn from me and what I do. So perhaps I need to be doing a lot more work with the materials myself, as my own work, when she is working. Even the much later stuff, to entice her and show her what the future holds.

Bear, on the other hand, I am not so concerned about... Today, he started doing this, copying his sister!

So, perhaps all is not lost, but the relationship between siblings is going to be a very important one, and one we need to make sure we build on. I know some siblings that never get on and are never close. Luckily, Addie is a natural teacher to Bear, and she loves helping him (far too much quite often!)... so even with presentations I might be tempted to adapt or even skip, I need to make sure I don't and that I do things properly, so that if she has the opportunity to teach, she can do it in the 'right' way. 

So, as the adults, and the main adults affecting our children's education, we must build a solid Montessori environment, in order to best facilitate this as a family of learners, each teaching each other. This reminded me of one of our scriptures: "Organise yourselves; prepare every needful thing, and establish a house, even a house of prayer, ...a house of faith, a house of learning, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God." 

Build it, and it will come...

Long term homeschool plans

This morning, for some reason, I felt that I had to consider our long-term home education plans. I have no idea why, and obviously things may change, life and our experiences may change the plans, as they so often do. So far, my ideas have not changed in the last couple of years, but what it looks like in reality at the moment is not what I expected.

Here is what I want to do in our home education journey.

Age 0-2
Lots of experiences, movement, language rich environment, starting to do some practical life exercises.

Age 2-2.5
Lots more practical life activities, language, experiences of the world.

Age 2.5-6
Montessori primary programme, using the Keys of the World albums, spending 1000 hours a year outside (influenced by Charlotte Mason). A major learning phase based on developing practical life skills, handwork skills, developing the senses, having a rich language programme, based on phonetics and within which by the age of 4, approximately, they should be 'writing' using the moveable alphabet or writing on paper, mathematics developing to being able to, by the age of 6, undertake basic mathematical operations. Through language and sensorial learning, comes a good foundation in the natural sciences, botany, zoology, physical sciences, geography, arts, music and a sense of history.

Age 6-12
Montessori elementary programme, using a combination of the Keys of the Universe albums and other Montessori elementary albums. This will include a study of the Great Lessons, which open up learning across all subjects - language arts, including modern foreign languages, mathematics, sciences - biology, botany, zoology, physical science, matter, astronomy, ecology, chemistry, geography, history, the arts, health sciences, peace and citizenship, design and technology. A focus on creativity, action and service, learning the arts, serving the community, being active and participating in sports. The aim, through the Montessori approach to develop learners who are enquirers, knowledgeable, thinkers, communicators, principled, open-minded, caring, risk-takers, balanced and reflective.

During this stage, and in the first part of the next stage, I am planning for us to travel the world. At the moment, I do not think that is possible in one chunk, so possibly over 3 years, 3 months at a time.

Age 12-16
Combining the approach of the Montessori adolescent programme, entrepreneurship and business, and the structure of the International Baccalaureate's Middle Years Programme - learning in the 8 areas of Language and Literature, Language Acquisition, Individuals and Societies (geography, history, politics, social sciences, economics, civics, business studies, psychology, sociology, anthropology), Sciences (environmental sciences, life sciences, physical sciences, sport sciences, health sciences, earth sciences), Mathematics, Arts (visual arts, media, dance, drama, music), Physical and Health Education, Design (digital and product design, coding, etc). Within these areas, there is a large opportunity for personal choice and autonomous learning. In addition, there will be goals in creativity, action and service, and a personal project to be undertaken each year (similar to the personal project undertaken at the end of the MYP5). It is my intention to encourage my children to pursue a GCSE or iGCSE or whatever the qualification is a the time in each of the 8 areas as a minimum. We will also start looking at the theory of knowledge which is part of the IB Diploma Programme.

Age 16-18
We will continue to follow a Montessori approach to learning, with academics falling within the IB Diploma Programme structure of 6 subjects - Language and Literature, Language Acquisition, Individuals and Societies, Sciences, Mathematics and the Arts, creativity, action and service and continuing the study of the theory of knowledge. Either this or something more career-related.

Creativity, Action and Service
This is another influence from the International Baccalaureate, and is quite loose in its structure. Creativity is defined as "arts and any other experiences that involve creative thinking", Action is defined as "physical exertion contributing to a healthy lifestyle, complementing academic work" and Service is defined as "an unpaid, voluntary exchange that has a learning benefit for the student". The CAS programme is part of the Diploma, but is something I would like to put aims on from the age of 6, to an extent. In the Diploma programme, it used to be a requirement that students had to complete a minimum of 50 hours of each across the programme (150 hours minimum), and many students completed hundreds of hours over the two years. I have no idea if I will put hourly requirements on the children, but I think it is important for a balanced education to cover these.

Obviously, all of my plans will probably change, and we will be child-led, so some areas may blur, some may be omitted or added to. I do want to have a form of structure to our learning, because I feel this is what will work best, but within a Montessori approach, so they have to have a well-rounded education, and there will be minimum requirements, but there will be a lot of room for maneouvre for personal study and following individual pursuits.

I felt that I had to do this, for whatever reason I felt prompted to. I know it might seem a little too 'planned out', but hey, I am a planner! I actually think that, given the Montessori elementary curriculum is, in places, akin to GCSE level, we may have to look at the 12+ curriculum when we get there!

I also know that many people follow a less structured approach, following the interests of the child. Although I seem to have everything planned out until 2032 (!), I am definitely not saying that it is set in stone. I would like to have what I feel is structure. We will not be sat at desks for hours every day, but I will follow the approach to learning that is established in the Montessori elementary years.

Watch this video for an idea of how that happens:

Elementary Meetings and Conferences from Montessori Guide on Vimeo.

HT2: March and April - What will it look like?

I have to plan... I have to plan otherwise I feel overwhelmed and unable to function. No idea why, I am just a very big planner. So, when it comes to home educating using Montessori it is nothing different.

I have mentioned before that we are using the Keys of the World albums, and on Montessori Nuggets there is a basic outline/suggestion broken down into 6-month intervals as to what presentations could be given within those 6 months. As always, you need to follow the child, so the intervals is just a suggestion, but I have found it very useful to me trying to plan everything. (Note: If you purchase the albums and online support, you get a more comprehensive list of all the exercises for each interval) (Another note: I used to love receiving the regular Montessori Nuggets to my inbox every week. I loved the insights contained within it, they really are little Montessori Nuggets of treasure... and I found out towards the end of last year that Jessica from the Keys (of the World & Universe) albums is the author of the nuggets too!).

I have planned the first half of 2015 based on Intervals 1 & 2. My reason for doing this is that Interval 1 should really have started when Addie was 2.5 years old, and Interval 2 when she is 3. She turned 3 in early February, plus quite a lot of the Interval 1 & 2 Practical Life work she has already done, as well as some of the Sensorial work, so I decided to combine the two intervals for Jan-June this year.

I have broken the 6 months into 3 chunks, so it is easier for planning and organising our work load, and adjusting our plans as need be is a lot easier. Each 'chunk' I have called a 'term' which is 2 months long, again, this is just so much easier than what I was doing before (7 weeks learning, one week off, or into another term of 7 weeks learning etc...) and I can actually remember when each term starts and ends, and it is just more logical to me.

HT2 is the name for our second term of the year (HT = Homeschool Term - I called it that once and it stuck) and is for March and April. What will this term hold for us? Well, for Bear who is nearly 15-months, it is more movement, starting to do a little bit of practical life work, nothing too tricky, and getting out in nature, learning language, etc.






With Addie, it is getting more exciting I think. We are moving into more Sensorial and Language work and I just know she is going to love it! What I have done is taken the number of new presentations listed in Interval 2 (bearing in mind we did some Interval 2 work last term), and worked out from that how many Practical Life, Language and Sensorial presentations we need to do each week. It works out as 1 or 2 new presentations a day over the whole week, covering things such as:

• poems
• living and non-living story and other biological classification
• lifecycles
• how to care for plants
• how to wash hands
• how to observe
• dressing frame work
• carrying on with the knobbed cylinders and pink tower
• introducing the brown stair and red rods
• starting the geometric cabinet work
• land, water and the continents work
• touch boards, tablets and fabrics
• baric tablets
• tasting bottles 
• and the binomial cube

I am excited for her, because I love all this work! I love the sensorial and language materials in this Interval particularly, and love how they are all laying the foundations for work a lot later on!

We are also going to be continuing our look at March and April in nature around the world with our books, getting outside lots to work on our 1000 Hours challenge, and of course, the sound games with Alphatales and as per the album, and being creative wherever we can...

Welcome to HT2...

Our most productive day yet!

In our new classroom, we spent 2.5 hours this morning (just under our planned goal of 3 hours a day). Wow! So much work was done, and a large variety of things, more than with our old way of doing things.

A cool extension I made loosely based on the geometric cards that go with the geometric cabinet!

Looking out the window for the horses, Addie says "Where neigh gone?"

In my element: The First Great Lesson

I am now part time schooling my 9-year old nephew, who I will call JJ. He attends state school Monday to Friday, but he is coming to me for 'extra' lessons on a Thursday after school and Saturday mornings to help him get where his teachers feel he should be. He is already above the average, but he has potential and should be further ahead.

I have been thinking what I would do to get him to where he should be in Maths and English without him feeling bored or overwhelmed with work, so I have decided to take the approach I know best - the Montessori way! I was just going to get him to do worksheets etc because that is what he is used to, but what does that teach him? Why would he want to learn if all he does is do the same thing over and over again, which gives him no fun or joy in learning. Isn't he much more likely to learn if he is doing something different?

So, I have told my sister I have a long term plan, and that it might not be completely obvious what direction I am taking with this. 

JJ would be in upper elementary in a Montessori school. However, I am having to adapt what I am doing to take into account that he has not had the first 3 years of Montessori elementary (primary in the UK), where a lot of groundwork is laid. He cannot, for example, do independent research to the level that is needed, and would struggle to do self-directed work. I am therefore using an approach which gives him choices, but within limits, and I will see how that goes.

Today I taught him the first Great Lesson - the Coming of the Earth. This introduces one version of how the world came to be - the Big Bang theory. There are several experiments that are done within it, and the concepts of atoms, different states of matter, land, air and water, volcanoes, the planets and the weather are introduced in this story. JJ picked up most on atoms and volcanoes, and didn't even pick up on the weather link, which is fine, because these lessons can be taught over when enthusiasm for learning wanes, and then they can pick up on the new ideas. What I love about this lesson is that it is introduced as the scientific theory, and follow up work is on creation myths, and can include the Biblical account of the creation also. 

JJ loved the experiments and is very keen to find out more about atoms. The next great lesson (the Coming of Life) will be taught next week, and he was hoping I would cover it today too, but no, he has to wait (the anticipation is a great way to build enthusiasm!).

Because I do not have JJ all week (although I would love to homeschool him!) I have set him some additional work to do. I have set it around three different areas - Personal, Research and Personal Finance. I am hoping that by approaching English and Maths from a different perspective, he won't feel like he is doing Maths or English, but doing something that is more fun. I took the idea of how to do this from a Montessori teacher who uses this method with students who have trouble deciding what work they will do, and I think it will work well, but we shall see. 

What I have given JJ is a table of choices of things he can do to earn different points, either 1, 2 or 3 points. By next Saturday he has to have done enough activities to have earned 12 points or more, and he has to do at least one activity from each of the areas. The activities for 1 point are simple, the ones for 3 points are more in-depth and the 2-pointers are somewhere in the middle. Each is designed to test and see how well he can do doing different things he needs to achieve, such as reading different types of text, summarising, writing a factsheet/bullet points, researching and understanding, describing characters and plots of fiction (note that 'describing' covers the grammar he is meant to know), making up his own writing and using different styles and lengths of sentences etc. This week his tasks revolve around the following areas:

Personal - goals and describing what it means to be a good friend

Research - reading his fiction book and describing characters/plot; reading non-fiction books (volcanoes or the solar system/a planet) and interpreting, understanding or summarising the facts and applying them; reading creation myths and making his own (with some illustrations included)

Personal finance - I want to make maths personal, and money is the way to go, so this revolves around his pocket money, and also budgeting 'Imagine you have £200 to redesign your bedroom - what would you have in there?'... I want to see how he applies maths, so I am hoping this will go well, although he already wants a big TV for his room (I think that blows the budget already!)

  

This is what the task list looks like, and each week I will give him a new one. He currently wants to do all the activities for 3 points, so we shall see how much he does. 

We also discussed what we need for learning to work, and we had a great discussion on what was important, which we will add to. This will become our ethos of his time with me on these days, and as he wants to learn more about atoms, then Martin will cover that one on Thursday with him.

I am in my 'element' (puns intended) because I love teaching 6-12 Montessori and now I get to! Woohoo! Keep reading for more Montessori adventures!

Homeschooling: Answering some questions

A few people have asked questions about why and how we will home educate our children, so here are a few answers...

Why are you home educating?

Good question. Well, the long and short of it is that we want our children to have an authentic Montessori education. We gained approval for a Montessori free school to open in our town, but were ousted by the governing body we recruited. Many things have since changed with the plans for the school which no longer fit into our educational aims for our children. There are no other schools in the area that offer Montessori to primary (elementary) level, so as we are qualified Montessori teachers, we will do it ourselves.

But what about socialisation?

Our children will have many opportunities to socialise. Firstly, there is family (many around the same age now). Secondly, there is church - lots of kids. Thirdly, we will require our children to take part in Guiding & Scouting, so they will interact there. Fourthly, they will also be able to take part in other groups & activities if they wish. Fifthly, there are many children in the area being home educated. We will try to link up with them, and if the groups match our educational aims (trust me some are just free for alls and chaotic) then we will attend them. I am also open to starting/running/joining any home ed co-ops (where several families come together once a week to do art, or a language, or science, or whatever really) in the area.

How will they get anywhere without qualifications?

Well, they will get qualifications. Some families choose to not put their children in for exams, but I think that is unwise and foolish (my opinion only). GCSEs and A Levels can be sat via the exam boards directly, or via places such as the National Extension College. If the NEC is still running when the time comes, we will opt for this option. Also, the International Baccalaureate is trialling some home education programmes, and I hope they continue to do this, as I would be interested in that as an alternative, and actually I will be using their approaches to learning anyway because I think they are the best preparation a child/teen can have for the world of work.

Will you have a schedule?

Yes. I think this is important. Many home schooling families don't have a strict schedule, or they 'unschool' where a child learns naturally from their interest and interactions in life. I'm not up for that. I am a disorganised person, and I, like them, need order and routine otherwise I am a mess. So, we will get up at 6am every day, have family learning and scripture study at 8am, and start Montessori school at 9am until 12pm. The afternoons will be free for outings, seeing relatives, shopping, activities, etc. We will also have term times and holidays of a sort, although these will be different to school ones (so we can have cheap holidays and also travel if possible).

Also, by having a schedule, they will know that timekeeping is important, that they need to work to a schedule, etc.

But they won't get enough education if you only do 3 hours a day...?

They will... trust me! They will get one-to-one and small group lessons all the time. How many children get that?! Just exactly how much time do children get taught for in school anyway when you take out registration, assemblies, break time, lunch time, sports, etc. And in a class of 30 children, how much one-to-one time will they get?

Also, if they want to carry on with a project or other work in the afternoon, then I won't stop them unless we have concrete plans. They can carry on until bedtime and at weekends too if they like! And when they get to secondary, at the very least when doing GCSEs, they may need to do an hour or two in the afternoons so we will just play that by ear.

Won't they get burnt out by your term structure? 

We will pretty much be learning all year round, because why should learning stop? We will have different paces throughout the year - September to December will keep going without a break - yep... no half term! (shock horror gasp splutter!)... Well, Montessori discovered that children absorb things from their environment all the time during the first 6 years of life. Children are always learning, why should we stop when they don't? Also, there are plenty of times to rest, relax, play and do fun things - every afternoon, weekends... and if something comes up that we just cannot miss out on, then we will even take a break in the morning from school! 

We will generally have 35 weeks of the year where we will be strictly educating, classroom based etc. Other than that, we will have 2 weeks 'off' at Christmas, where our learning will be about Christmas etc. We will still have our 1 hour family learning and scripture study time, and do crafts, read books, shop for presents, etc too so there will still be learning going on. We will have a week out from school at the Temple in April, and then 14 weeks over the summer where we will be learning outdoors, travelling, going to the beach or the forest or the park, gardening, swimming. But we will still be learning, keeping up with language and maths skills, and I will try to keep these more applied, like reading a bus timetable, budgeting for activities, etc. Also, the activities we will do will naturally have some basis in education - education is all around us! Travelling to a new place - foreign language study possibly, geography, history, learning about new cultures. Going to the beach - tides, geography (Bournemouth has a great bay!), zoology - I have seen lizards and crabs, birds of prey, fish and otters just taking the in-laws around Bournemouth! And so it can go on... 

Will they be at an educational disadvantage?

No. Any parent can teach their child to be honest, and I do have the benefit of being Montessori-trained. However, my children will not be disadvantaged educationally by being educated at home, and it is my responsibility to make sure they get the best education they can get. There are no limits, no set curriculum, no restraints. I quite often call the Montessori method a curriculum, and I do have albums with lesson plans in, but these mainly tell me how to teach the equipment. However, there are countless other things that children can be taught, mainly in what is regarded as the 'cultural' part of the 'curriculum' (geography, science (astronomy, botany, zoology, matter, chemistry, physics, etc), history, ecology, art, music etc). And for these areas, there are some Montessori materials, but every Montessori school is different because the majority of materials to teach these subjects are lovingly made by teachers to meet their children's needs. 

Montessori has been developed over decades and is in line with how children learn naturally, and actually often will excel earlier than other children in some areas. I have witnessed children reading fluently in phonetic words at the age of 4 before they start school, and doing addition, subtraction, multiplication (up to 10 times table) and division at the same age because the Montessori materials, designed to be so attractive to them and motivate them to learn, appeal to their natural learning patterns, and they cannot put the materials down until they have finished learning with them. Plus, many times, they love it and it does not feel like the drudgery of learning, because it is fun and engages them for hours! A child who needs more time can also have it, rather than being rushed on to the next subject having not grasped the more basic ones. 

Observation is key in Montessori and I will always be observing and making notes on my children's learning, so this will help me assess and guage their learning without SATs or other formal assessment tests in primary etc.

Although it is not necessary, I will also be attempting to map their learning against national targets (although if I know that a certain skill will be learnt by doing something else later, I won't be stressing out about it too much). I have a great Montessori record keeping system online, which allows me to put in the national targets, and then identify which of the Montessori exercises meet them when I enter the Montessori exercises. Then it automatically tracks this for me. Cool!

We will also have a lot more educational opportunities than children will get in school. We can learn all the time, or at our own pace. We can go to museums, do activities, visit attractions, put our learning into practice etc much more than a child can do in school. We can learn more, do more, see more, experience more. The world is their classroom.

Is it legal to home educate?

Absolutely! The law says it is the parents' responsibility to ensure that their child gets an education until aged 18 (I am paraphrasing) but it does not dictate that a child has to actually attend a school. In some countries it is illegal to home educate, but not here, and I hope it never will be. We actually don't even have to tell anyone we are home educating, although if a child is withdrawn from school to be home educated, the authorities do need to know. However, you can inform the local authority if you wish, and we may do this. Many home educating parents do not want inspections and regulation, because they are home educating to be free from the system. 

However, I think there needs to be some regulation or notification at least because I have experienced 3 home educating families where severe problems have been hidden because they have not had to declare they are educating their child at home. One was severe abuse of children, one where a child is just not taught at all and at age 7 can only just write her name and recognise numbers 1-10, and one where a child is never apart from her mother, who has attachment issues. I think the child was premature or something, but the child cannot function without her mother present, and her mother cannot leave her child anywhere without her. Also, the mother's idea of teaching English is getting her child to make up her own language and spell that way (a gobbledegook language, she cannot write or read English well at all!). The child also cannot run, because her hamstrings are too tight (a 7-year old saying that is concerning in itself) and cannot play with other children because she is never given the opportunity. These situations are horrific to witness, and I know there are the majority of home educating families out there whose children are doing fantastically well, and are better socialised than those in school. I just would not be opposed to some form of registration at least to home educate.

Do you get financial assistance?

No, not a penny. State schools are allocated around £3000-4000 per student per year, but if you home educate or send a child to a private school they get no financial assistance. I think this is a shame, especially for home educated kids, as the parents do have to fork out on some kind of equipment for their children. How much does depend on how you home educate though, and many do this on a budget. Montessori can also be done on a budget, and shortcuts can be taken, however, we are planning at the moment to buy as many authentic Montessori materials as possible, and I will make many of them too. We are already budgeting for this, so hopefully we will be able to do as we plan. Also, home educating means that we sacrifice one income - mine. But, again, we have planned for this, and we have set up our own business, Martin works from home (and will have an office too away from home from this week onwards). The business will support us enough to cover both incomes, even if business is slow. And we can adapt it and amend things to match market demands, so for the medium term it will work anyway.

What about sports?

What about sports? In a Montessori classroom anyway, children are naturally more active because they can move around as they please. We have our garden, and our children will be able to play out there, run around, etc. Afternoons can be spent running and playing at the park, or rambling in a country park or nature reserve. A requirement will be at least once a week swimming. We will teach them tennis and go cycling once I recover from my c-section later this year. They will do yoga, and relaxation. We will go on long walks. They can go ice skating, rock climbing (Go Outdoors even has a climbing wall, minimum £1 donation!), play football, etc if they want. From the age of 2, I want Addie to do some form of dance & theatre, maybe ballet. If she wants to do martial arts she can do. At age 3 there is the local football club for preschoolers. We may not be able to afford everything from a club point of view, but the children will be involved in making budgeting decisions about that, and there are so many free things to do. Basketball in the park, archery, fishing, high ropes, rock climbing at Cubs, Brownies, Scouts, etc. There will not be a shortage of sports and activities to keep them active and healthy, and it will become part of our way of life, not just when you are forced to by a teacher you don't necessarily like!

Is it going to be a lot of work?

Yes. And no. The Montessori equipment is great because the children are presented it and shown how to use it, and then they are free to use that equipment for as long or as short a time as they want. Many of the pieces of equipment are used over and over and have more than one learning objective (some are used for 3 year olds, 6 year olds and 9 year olds, at different levels!) 

Sometimes this can mean that a child will grab hold of a concept and work on it tirelessly for hours, days or even weeks. Can I sit back and do nothing? No, but my role adapts to this, and I watch them, perhaps while preparing something else or working with another child. Sometimes a child is not interested in learning the things they have been shown. It is then the duty of the teacher to find something that will work, or observe and re-teach it later. 

There are many materials that do have to be made by me, which means sourcing or making up the documents, printing, cutting, laminating for durability, cutting, sorting, storing, binding etc. But, hopefully, once these are done they can be used for all my children and I can just store them away ready for the next child to use. I have many of these already, or ready to print (sourcing and making them up can be very time consuming, or could take a couple of hours depending on what it is). Montessori uses many manipulatives rather than just words or concepts on paper, but I love making materials so although it will take me time, I don't mind. 

Many of my lesson plans I have already in my albums from my studies, and my studies have given me the opportunity to be able to think up new activities using the Montessori method quite quickly. And I just have to follow each child's learning path, so when they show signs of being ready to learn something, I will be able to get things ready quickly (I hope) so I can teach it. 

I do have to plan, write up records, observations etc, and prepare for each day, but that is no more than if I was a teacher in a school, except I have fewer students! Also, I am looking it as a form of journalling for my children, so I am excited to get going.

For those of you who do not know what I mean about preparing materials for learning - keep coming back to my blog and follow our journey - you will soon see what I mean!

Other concerns

There are several other concerns that people have raised, such as won't they be missing out? Well, they will be missing out on being in a bustling school and class of 30 students, with the inevitable troublemakers who distract and disrupt the course. They will be missing out on being held back or pushed to move on to keep the pace of the rest of the class, and they may feel they are missing out on going to school. However, I hope that we can show them and help them realise that actually being at home is much better. The world is their school, and the opportunities are endless, not constrained by a national curriculum, attainment targets, adults who with all the best will and intentions in the world cannot give 30 children everything they need educationally all the time. I take my hat off to teachers, I think they do a great job. But for my kids, who I will know better than anyone, I will be the best teacher they will have, and if they want to learn about Africa or Aberystwyth, Zoology or sewing a zip - they can and they will, for as long as they want until that interest has passed. 

Got any other questions? Post them in the comments below and I will do my best to answer them