We have a brilliant set of books called Art from the Past that Sam spends a lot of time browsing. For the last 3 years or so I’ve been promising him a Trojan Horse. So using the 1000 coffee stirrers I was sent in the run up to Christmas, I give you…
It even holds soldiers
Long time since I’ve posted properly but we’ve been busy catching up with friends. Including spending some lovely days with Jack’s oldest friend and her family who emigrated to the US four years ago but have been home for the summer.
We’ve been pushing on with Jack’s workbooks in an attempt to finish off all the current ones before holiday, ready to start anew when we get back in Sep. We had fun looking at electricity.
Using static electricity to make a tissue paper man stand up
making and testing circuits
Sam’s been working more on his Egyptian project.
Making an Egyptian collar
And we’ve been buying too many books 
Books, Glorious Books
Due to a combination of Google being awkward, Virgin completely crashing, holiday and preparing for holiday it’s been a long time since I’ve updated.
a trip to Portchester Castle, where we had a play on the castle and then joined some friends on the field nearby for Hannah’s birthday picnic,
Which have sprouted already. When they are a bit bigger we will turn one upside down to see what happens.
Aside from Camping most of what we have been doing since Easter is standard run of the mill work and play. We’ve had usual home ed group, drama, cubs and rainbows (where boys get a couple of hours playing with the other guider’s children).
And we made a helicopter. The kit has stayed out for most of the week and we’ve had some fun playing with it.
Sam has begun working through Schofield and Simms Mental Arithmetic book alongside the Key Maths.
Watching dvds about Tutenkhamen, Cleopatra and Ramses the Great.
Which I accidentally burnt (they were red, yellow and blue when they went in)
Poetry has always been a favourite.
We had a trip to Southampton where I cheered up a poorly Sam (he was fine when we left the house …) with a trip to the Build a Bear Factory.
And setting up wars and battles with Airfix soldiers,
we are getting back into the swing of ‘work’.
And made some Egyptian God puppets.
Then Jack went out to play with friends and Sam and I watched The History of Celtic Britain and played Animal Jam on the National Geographic website (although I did have to go and find Jack to make it work )
We’ve been getting in the Easter spirit and making baskets and nests,
and decorating eggs.
…Just in case anyone is wondering where we have gone that pretty much sums it up.
We have the next years up ready to go but decided to have a change and do some Schofield and Simms Maths first.
We have carried on with ‘The Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading’. Never saw myself being a reading scheme type, certainly wasn’t with Jack. But it is working well with Sam. He is starting to read aloud from books to himself and tell me ‘that says …’. But if you ask him he can’t read!
We have carried on with worksheets from these.
But over the last week, we’ve introduced these for a bit of variety.
Sam is enjoying the writing practice book.
We finished the Ancient Mesopotamia pocket from his Ancient Civilizations project,
and started Ancient Egypt. We are going to have to come up with our own bits for this I think as being a particular interest of Sam’s he knows way more than the information in the unit.
Jack has done lots of piano practice and is coming on well.
We started this Maths book a few weeks ago (our 3rd KS2 level course) really as a confidence boost as there is nothing in it we haven’t covered and he is cracking through it at a fast pace. 
These are the books we have been using for English and Science. We started the course a year later than he would have started in school and have been going through them at a faster pace. Now he is on the last chapter of both.
Off out so haven’t much time to post now so will try and come back later.
While it seems it hasn’t quite filtered through to Jack yet.
Sam practised writing like a Viking with the help of a Horrible Histories book.
Then we got out some clay and Sam made a stone tablet. It says Nebuchadnezzar, King of Persia in Sumarian (or possibly Assyrian).
And finally it’s an Assyrian bull!
Sam carried on with some of his Mesopotamian history pocket.
The sun was out so the garden beckoned.
Yesterday was home ed group and they filled pancakes and played. I forgot camera.
esterday was one of those days where it all seems a struggle. Hard to identify why as on the face of it we achieved a lot. Boys were constantly nitpicking at one another, everything seemed to take longer than it should and it took at least 3 times of asking and quite often a raised voice for them to do anything I asked of them. And we all just seem to be irritating each other.
by adding a timeline.
And starting the second; making puppets,
colouring a book,
and making a pop-up card of a ziggurat
Jack moved on from rocks to magnets. He started by testing things around the house,
including his brother!
He did a couple of exercises in the book and then designed a machine for testing and recycling cans.
Sam joined in with a machine for making coffee.
At lunch Sam and I watched The History of Ancient Britain, which we really enjoyed. Sam has odd taste in TV for a 5yo.
Then there was time to construct ‘something’ in the back garden.
Activity Village updates
