Check out CurrClick's freebie pages!!!

If you haven't come across CurrClick before, then I would definitely recommend you go take a look. They have so many resources covering all academic topics, which you do have to pay for, although I don't find it expensive.

PLUS they also have a freebies section which Masha'Allaah is very impressive, there's about 5 pages full right now, this evening I've purchased a cursive handwriting course E-book from them and an Aesop's fables Copywork book, plus from their freebies pages, I've downloaded a few resources, such as : Amphibians Unit study, Journal Junction: signs of spring, TBB calendar card kit, and a few others.

These are all sitting on my desktop now, waiting to be used, can't wait insha Allaah ! :D

Home Educators in record petition to MPs, and some thoughts from me :)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/8404635.stm

The law is that children should receive a "suitable education" for their age and aptitudeMore than 70 MPs have handed in petitions from opponents of plans for the compulsory registration of families who educate their children at home.

Commons petitions from more than 120 constituencies were presented - a record on one subject in one day.

They call on England's ministers not to go ahead with plans for a register or with proposals for council officials to be given new powers to enter homes.

Ministers say the reforms will check children are "safe and learning".

The plans came from a review into home education carried out by Graham Badman, which reported in June.Kent's former head of education had been asked to check if local authorities were monitoring and supporting home educating families properly.

As part of this, he also looked at whether home education could be a cover for abuse.

'Harass families'

The presentation was led by Conservative MP for Beverley and Holderness, Graham Stuart.The petition for his constituency said:

"Petitioners believe the recommendations are based on a review that was extremely rushed, failed to give due consideration to the evidence, failed to ensure that the data it collected were sufficiently robust, and failed to take proper account of the existing legislative framework".

It went on to say the proposals should be withdrawn and instead steps should be taken to make sure local authorities were following existing guidelines on home education.Our reforms are looking at how we can put in place better checks and balances, so we can be confident every child is safe and learning.
Diana Johnson, Schools Minister.

In a statement on his website, Mr Stuart said: "These petitions show the extent of opposition across the country to proposals which will give local authorities the power to harass families who educate their children at home, even when there is no suspicion they have done anything wrong."

On the basis of a rushed study and flimsy evidence, the government is proposing to spend tens of millions of pounds going into the homes of home-educating families and subjecting them to inspections and a licensing regime."

Schools Minister Diana Johnson said:

"We fully support the right of parents to educate their children at home, that is why, as part of our response to Graham Badman's review, we are providing more support to those parents who choose to do so."

''Children who are home educated will have better access to things like school libraries, sports facilities and music lessons and we will also provide more tailored support for children with special educational needs"

''Our reforms are looking at how we can put in place better checks and balances, so we can be confident every child is safe and learning."

What Schools Minister, Diana Johnson said at the end of this article, I found very positive, I myself am not against the Education Authorities making it compulsory for all home educators to register, as I think it is something which needs to be done, because unfortunately not everyone who keeps their children at home are genuinely home educating them, there are always cases of child abuse coming up, and if this is something that needs to be done in order to make sure children are genuinely be educated and looked after then so be it.

I hope though that we will get the support we need, and not be looked down upon or criticised, and that there will be more facilities available for those who are home educating, insha Allaah.

I may be close to having a visit from the LEA, my daughters go to a school in the afternoon where they learn Qur'an/arabic/Maths/English and Science, and today the LEA turned up unexpectedly, they questioned my youngest daughter, now the teacher has said I need to fill some kind of form in, presumably for the LEA.

I can feel myself panicking already, and the stress is slowly building, I keep asking myself 'why all the panic?' for me, I'm worrying because my one daughter is very behind, last year didn't go as well as I'd hoped, and I'm just worrying that they're going to refuse my application of home educating, especially my eldest.

Is this what happens? could they just insist I put them in school, or would they give me time to come up to what they would call 'standard' ?

In some ways I'm also looking forward to having contact with them, if they do contact me that is, not to always have that worry, and just to keep me on my toes more insha Allaah.

Anyway will keep you updated insha Allaah.

Our new spelling programme

I am so excited!!........I've chosen a spelling programme which I think will be really good for the girls insha Allaah, I have read about it briefly before but never really looked into it, you can take a look at a sample page here of book 1, which can either be bought through post or as an E-book. The name of the programme is Sequential Spelling, and does not follow the traditional way of learning to spell, but rather helps the student to identify the different spelling patterns in words, it is a 7 level programme, and works from easy words up to the more advanced.

I was very impressed when I had a look at the sample pages, it is very different to how spelling is normally taught, and looks far more easier. I will let you know how they get on with it insha Allaah.

I've provided some links below to more info about this programme.

FAQ'S

What makes Sequential Spelling different?

Plus here is a blog article I found through another blog, written by a home school mum who uses this programme.

Animal Classification display posters

I was mentioning yesterday my plan to introduce Animal Classification to the girls, I did start with T(6) today, she's just working through her lapbook at the moment. I was looking for some printable posters to put up on the wall, really hoping I would find some free ones, but unfortunately I didn't, but I did find some which I purchased for £2, which wasn't bad. There's 9 colourful posters, and the descriptions for each group are very clear alhamdulillaah.

Insha Allaah, will laminate them and pop them up on the wall later.

If you follow the link, you'll find the posters are the twelfth ones down.

Dealing with an injured finger!

Before I go off to bed, I thought I'd do a quick blog update, Yesterday T(6) jammed her finger in the door, so we didn't get off to a good start at all, Qadr Allaah, at first I thought her nail was half off, so I started panicking, it was horrible, but once I was able to look at it, I realised it was the skin on the finger that had been pushed forward, not very nice to look at, but I'm glad the nail was fine alhamdulillaah. T was a bit shocked, love her, she didn't want to look at it first of all, but she eventually calmed down. She's had it checked by a doctor and they said it should be fine insha Allaah, but did suggest we may want to take her to A&E if we suspect there's any problems with movement etc... so as you can guess, there's wasn't much homeschooling going on here yesterday!


Today, we've mainly been working on Maths and English, T(6) who is feeling a lot better alhamdulillaah is doing well with her reading Masha'Allaah, we're still working through the Reading Reflex, today she worked on the sound 'th' , Masha'Allaah it went well, we also read book 3A, from the synthetic phonics series. Alhamdulillaah T is able to read many of the sight words in the books so far, especially as they repeat often.

T also did a bit of cursive writing practice, and Masha'Allaah she's not too bad at it, I was impressed, Just need lot's of practice insha Allaah. She also did a bit of Maths from her workbook, counting money, and then went on some of the Science clips and activities on the BBC, she had fun alhamdulillaah.

K(9) did some work on vowels and consonants today from her workbook, some Maths, and Masha'Allaah she is progressing, as I mentioned before she is quite far behind for her age, but I'm pleased with how she's now starting to get a bit more comfortable with working with bigger numbers, even myself, I'm learning all over again! that's definitely one of the many beauties of homeschooling, we can re-educate ourselves at the same time :)

That's about all we did today, K went to Madrassah in the afternoon, she has also started doing Maths and English there now, so I'm hoping that will give her the extra help she needs insha Allaah. I kept T home today, so I did work with her in the afternoon, as she was at the Doctors in the morning.

Insha Allaah I plan to introduce animal classification with the girls tomorrow, I've printed the lapbook resources off from Homeschool Share , also I purchased a downloadable unit studies pack which looks quite good, you can view some preview pages here.

So will looking forward to starting that with them tomorrow insha Allaah.

Thanks for reading :D

Yearly plans for Science

For those looking for a spine for teaching Science, I came across these yearly plans and thought they may be useful,

Year 1

Year 2

Year 3

Year 4

Year 5

Year 6

Home Educators and The Truancy Act

Another article from IHSAN

Another LEA experience.

Here's another encounter with the LEA from the same website, a more positive experience from the start alhamdulillaah, it does make you feel better when you hear these stories, it also makes me feel more encouraged to register with them, and if I was to do so, the reason would mainly be to keep me on my toes a bit more, insha Allaah.

One parent's experience with the LEA.

Masha'Allaah I found an interesting article on the IHSAN website, regarding the LEA, it is one sister's experience with them.

I myself, have not registered with them as yet, although I have been thinking lately whether to do so or not. A few experiences I read about before plus this one kind of made me feel a bit negative towards involving them, but I have heard a couple of positive stories at the same time, so you just don't know until it's your turn I suppose.

All I can do is try my best with my kids to give them the best education I possibly can.