Roller Skating

Today we met up with out home-school friends for roller skating at Penrith Skatel. This was the highlight of R's year, but it was "too slippery" for L.

Here's some video from the day:

Glow-In-The-Dark Sand Pictures

Today we tried a Glow Explosion Sand picture kit from Crayola.

We don't use kits very often but L had bought this one with her own money so we decided to give it a go. I have to say as kits go it was pretty rubbish. There's too little sand and the sand is too wet to pour on properly, whilst the glow only lasts about 4 hours. Well the kids had fun anyway. Here's the results:

Cat by L

Lightening by R

Dragon by L

Versatile Blogger Award

Today I received my first blog award from April at Learning Alongside So thanks very much for that April xxx

Rules for the versatile blogger award are:

• Thank the person who gave you the award and link back to them.
• Tell your readers 7 things about yourself.
• Give this award to 15 recently discovered bloggers.
• Contact those bloggers and let them in on the news.

So here's 7 things about me:

• Even though I now live in Australia I was born, and grew up in London.
• I'm an experienced primary teacher but I gave that up so I could be an unpaid teacher of my own children.
• I was diagnosed as dyslexic in my 30s, something which was not picked up in school.
• As well as teaching I have also studied Geology at degree level.
• The only sport I really enjoy is swimming.
• I failed cookery at school - but no one around here seems to be starving!
• I'd be back at college studying textiles part time right now if such a course existed locally - grrrr.

Recently discovered blogs:

Here are my favourites, not sure if they are recently discovered, and these's only 5  but here goes anyway:

• Art Projects For kids
• Davinci's Wings
• Deep Space Sparkle
• Pink And Green Mama
• SmART Class

Bikies

Today R got a new bike and rode for the first time without training wheels.

Models, Models, Models

This weekend we went along to the Sydney Society of Model Engineers model park open day. We got to see a variety of model cars racing about, model aeroplanes, and model trains. We had a go on the slot cars and rode the railway. Meanwhile the dad's plotted their next purchases. 

Petrol cars on the track

Remote control plane

Kids in "home school uniform" ???

Home Educators slot car race

Model railway

The train ride

Emergent Writing

I love you Mummy

Here's a lovely piece of writing that L (age 3.5) did for me the other day all by herself.

Coconut Cakes

This week the children made coconut cakes - yummy!

Phoenician Bread

Following on from our study of the ancient Phoenicians the children ditched the bread maker and made some Phoenician bread by hand.

Phoenician Glass

Today we have been learning about ancient Phoenicians. We found out that they were the first people's to successfully make blown glass objects. The children made some coloured fake glass using wax crayons.

First we cut out 2 ovals each from baking paper and then placed crayon pencil shavings on top of 1 oval.

Next we added some sequins and bits of sparkly threads along with more wax.

Once we had a good layer of wax we embedded a hanging thread within it and then covered it with the other oval of baking paper. We then ironed the wax sandwich between sheets of newspaper. 

Once the wax ovals were cool we peeled them off the baking paper and then hung them up in a sunny window.

By L

By R

Steam And Machinery

Today we attended the biannual open day at Campbelltown Steam & Machinery Museum. We have been to this museum several times in the past and you can read a previous blog post here. I decided to try and photograph different things on this visit and have a play with the images in Photoshop. For a great tutorial on colour popping in Photoshop (like the picture above) check out this video from Photo Answers. The other images were made with various filters in Photoshop.

The children had a great time riding the train and tractor, visiting the blacksmith and having a good look at all the strange machines. We saw the grand parade of vehicles including steam engines and tractors and everyone loved the musical organs.

Fungi Nature Study

This week the children have been studying the fungi kingdom. They did these observational drawings of a mushroom.

Mushroom By R

Underneath a mushroom By L

Mushroom By L