The last month of summer, it’s already feeling chilly here and it’s only the beginning of September! Most of August was still the school holidays, so the kids made the most of the month with no ‘after school’ clubs and groups. We also had some time away at my parents on the West Coast of Scotland. It is the perfect place for kayaking around the rocky coastline.
We learn all year round, so there’s no summer holidays from learning. This is because we don’t do any formal learning, all of the kids lives are considered learning. It’s a hard concept to get your head around when you are used to schools. But there is so much learning in day-to-day living and kids play that they learn a lot every single day. This year the eldest would now be entering S1 (1st year of secondary school in Scotland, around 12 years old) and littlest into P6 (6th year of primary school in Scotland, around 10 years old).
Table of Contents
History – Home Educator
As always history includes the podcasts ‘Who, When, Wow’ and ‘Greeking Out’. They are great for learning interesting things from history. We also have read various books together on different history topics too.
We visited a few historic places this month. Including Falkland Palace in Fife. I’ve never been before, but it was really interesting to find out more about the Royal Hunting Lodge and the oldest Real Tennis court in the UK. It was extensively restored by the Victorians, so there’s a bit of a Victorian twist to what it would have been like when James V had it built. the kids listened to the guides in the palace and also filled in some kids sheets too. Although the eldest mostly drew over his with fighting stick figures!
This August we also visited Linlithgow Palace again this month. It’s a great place to visit with kids, there’s the extremely interesting history, but also lots of areas to explore and the grassy peel outside for playing.
We also took the time to visit the small Dunblane Museum, somewhere we haven’t visited for years. Fortunately it’s still just as amazing, with lots of local history. The kids favourites are the information about the battle at Sherrifmuir and information about the Atlantic Wall. Plus the dressing up of course.
Science
Starting off the science section are podcasts again. We’ve listened to Tumble, Wow in the World, How To Be An Earthling and Mysteries of Science. They are all fantastic shows and the kids learn a lot from each of them. It’s also great for questions that lead on to more research.
We’ve also visited a few places that have had a science theme. Including Blairdrummond safari park (kids had free tickets from completing the local summer reading challenge), where we saw lots of animals, including the tigers, sea lions, meerkats, lions, rhino’s and more. Of course the kids enjoyed the play park too!
At the Edinburgh festival we visited the Doktor Kaboom show, which is basically a hilarious science show. Doktor Kaboom spun the wheel and whatever science experiment it landed on he performed. There were around 4-5 different experiments, which we all loved watching.
English
The children have completed the summer reading challenge this month. They only had to read 6 books to complete it, although the eldest easily went over that! He’s read so many books that I’ve lost count! We also went to the book festival to see Cressida Cowell and buy her new book in the Which Way To Anywhere series. Which he got to chapter 4 in the queue for the signing and had finished it within 5 days!
I think the library may be a little sick of seeing us atm! I decided we should make the most of it rather than trying to keep up with the eldest’s reading, which would cost way too much if we bought everything!
The youngest is still working his way through Reading Eggs and can read easy readers when he tries. However, he does find them quite boring. It’s definitely difficult to find books he would like to read that match his ability. He’s been loving Abi Elphinstone’s Saving Neverland and The House of Chicken Legs by Sophie Anderson. It’s a shame there aren’t some more thrilling early reader books for kids who are later readers. We still read plenty to him (and his brother) anyway, so he gets to listen to the exciting stories too.
Maths – Home Educator
Both children have been enjoying Prodigy Maths as there is now the opportunity to complete the game. Which wasn’t available previously. It’s not easy to do though, so they’ve been working on improving their characters and ‘pets’ to get there. Prodigy involves answering math questions to cast spells. It’s a fun way to learn maths!
We’ve also been playing various math based board games, including Zeus on the Loose, Monopoly and Ticket to Ride.
Geography
The kids haven’t done a huge amount of geography this month. However they have been playing with their interactive globe, I do wonder if they would be able to identify countries from their national anthems, as that’s their favourite mode! Ha ha! But they do occasionally test themselves on their knowledge of countries.
We also have various maps and and flag charts around the house, which the kids do like to look at occasionally!
Art and Music
Art has mostly consisted of sketching doodles all over the place for eldest. He also decided to make a new heap of paper aeroplanes, decorating them with different designs. He’s quite proficient at paper plane making now!
Littlest has been listening to his music playlist constantly, he loves singing along or dancing too.
Clubs and Groups
Most the kids groups are off for the summer holidays. However, the youngest took part in show in a week with a local theatre group. They did a version of Peter Pan that was great and littlest had a fantastic time at rehearsals throughout the week.
Kids groups and clubs did start back at the end of August when the Scottish school holidays were over. So they had a couple of evenings at Scouts, Cubs, dodgeball, gymnastics, dancing and drama groups. Littlest also started a new acro and commercial dance class (as if he wasn’t busy enough already!) and had a cub camp on the last weekend of the month.
1000 Hours Outside – Home Educator
The kids have managed a LOT more this month outside. Whether it’s just playing outside with friends, to camping overnight with the Cubs for littlest. We also spent hours kayaking along the West Coast and the kids jumping in the water playing. Let’s perhaps forget the fact littlest was stung by a stray Lion’s Mane tentacle though!
We’re definitely over 3/4’s the way through the challenge now. I’d guesstimate that they have less than 200 hours left to complete it. Although I can’t actually be bothered counting up those squares at the moment!
All Our Home Ed Monthly Diaries For 2023
- January 2023
- February 2023
- March 2023
- April 2023
- May 2023
- June 2023
- July 2023
- August 2023
- September 2023
- October 2023
- November 2023
- December 2023