October Home Education Diaries 2022: Home Education UK Blog

October is a very busy month for us as Halloween is a very big thing up here in Scotland. The kids all love dressing up and going out guising, which is when they go to houses and do a little piece of entertainment and are offered sweets in return. Littlest recited the witches chant from Shakespeare’s Macbeth and the eldest told a spooky joke. Jokes are always most common and easiest, but it’s always nice to have other things if you’re at the door listening to all the jokes for the night!

Most of the kids classes were off for a couple of weeks for the October holidays too. So there were less places to go, which can be nice!

Table of Contents

History

The kids absolutely love history and are more than happy to go to museums and castles to learn more. We chose to go to Dynamic Earth this month as they have a deal that when you visit in October you get an annual pass for the rest of the year. Fantastic for us as it means we can visit again several times throughout the year. Dynamic Earth is about the history of the earth from its origin in the Big Bang to present day.

Dynamic Earth sabre tooth tiger sculpture

The kids and I also went to a few different castles with other home schoolers. Pictured above is Blackness Castle, but we also visited Stirling castle and Doune castle again too. Scottish castles are definitely something we enjoy visiting at all times of year. I’m hopeful that more will open again in Scotland, as many were shut due to masonry issues this year.

As usual the children have enjoyed listening to different history podcasts. Favourites are still Greeking Out and Who, When Wow. They are great for introducing different myths and real people from history. We also have read a variety of books that include historical topics, mostly Greek as that’s where their current passion lies.

Science

Science covers a huge amount of topics, so it’s always a funny one to work out what fits in here, maths or even history and geography sections! So you might see a little bit of a repeat!

The kids have been enjoying doing Minecraft education coding with Plassroom over the last few months. Coding is not always straightforward, but they are learning how to do a variety of different things. Most of it has been through animals biomes and space scenarios. Currently they are digging on Venus and Mercury for samples!

children participating in a Minecraft coding session

The kids have continued listening to their favourite science podcasts this month. These include Wow In the World, Tumble, Earth Rangers, Flip & Mozi’s Guide to Being an Earthling and Mysteries of Science and Nature. We generally listen when we’re in the car on journeys.

Our eldest has really got into baking, so he often spends a day each week making a new creation. Recently creations have included apple pie, danish pastries (which didn’t work so well!) and a birthday cake with sweets inside. Of course the failures are just as important as those that work. Finding out why something didn’t rise or the dough turned out cake like rather than flaky pastry is very useful and definitely a science experiment!

The youngest has also chosen to make some of his Lego Gearbot creations. He was given this for his birthday months ago and only finally chose to make it! Don’t underestimate gifts that haven’t yet been used.

Geography

As I mentioned previously we visited Dynamic Earth this month. It has a lot to do with science, but this also fits into geography. Learning about different biomes and exploring the ocean in the new exhibit is definitely part of geography.

As per usual we have plenty of maps and globes around the house that the kids like to talk about every so often. They have also been using the interactive globe a lot again.

English

The eldest is continuing to read various books, he seems to have 2-3 books on the go! He’s a good way through the 7th Harry Potter book, but reads others at the same time. We went to spend his birthday money and vouchers, which included National Book Tokens. So he chose several fiction books along with a book about the Ancient Greeks.

The youngest has been practicing with Reading Eggs a little more often. He can read more than he lets on, it’s just easier to let someone else do it for him. With 2 parents, a brother and plenty of friends who can read, it seems easy for him to just ask someone else to do it. So I’m trying to encourage him to practice more often!

Maths

There’s a fairly large crossover with science and maths, both being STEM topics. So baking is definitely part of maths, not just weighing and measuring. But also telling the time and adding time on to work out when bakes need to be taken out.

Coding is also definitely a maths topic too. It wouldn’t work well without numbers and logic! So the kids Minecraft education classes also count as maths lessons!

Finally we’ve being playing various board games which definitely include maths too. Zeus on the loose is a particularly good maths game! Both children go to chess club, which is great for maths and logic skills.

Art and Music

We’ve been doing a little more in the arts section of the kids lives this month. Visiting Enchanted Forest near Pitlochry is all about art with lights. It’s amazing what you can create with different coloured lights, music and effects. A different type of art to simply drawing!

The children have also started a 4 week home education art course, which they have loved. Starting with lino printing, then a collaborative collage. It’s been great to see them happy being experimental and using their own ideas to create. I don’t particularly like the classes where everyone is shown how to make the same painting or design! This is much more about different techniques.

Clubs and Groups

Although the kids had two weeks off from classes and groups, they still attended quite a few. Obviously they started the art class above, chess club and littlest still has his swimming class. But we also had various meet ups with friends and the kids have attended the usual classes.

Littlest has Cubs, gymnastics, drama, dodgeball, dancing and Stagecoach. Whereas eldest just started at Scouts (finally given a place!) after the holidays and also has dodgeball.

1000 Hours Outside

We haven’t had as many hours outside as summer months, but the kids are on the way to completing 900 hours. We just need to try and spend a bit more time outside again despite the pretty awful wet and windy weather!