Seven stories visit, medal biscuits and dot-to-dot

We dropped Stuart off this morning, visited the library and made an impromptu visit to Seven Stories afterwards. Harry completed the Judith Kerr exhibition activity sheet, by looking at the artwork on the walls for the answers. Harry and Peter enjoyed making tea for The Tiger.

We played Land of Goodies in the Enid Blyton exhibition and I read them the first chapter of The Secret Seven. Harry remembered lots of detail of this to tell Stuart tonight.

They both made medals in the craft area. Peter loved using a little hole puncher and covered his medal with decorative holes! 

Peter was really tired when we got home and had a nap. Harry and I listened to the last hour of Prince Caspian. We then made our medal biscuits inspired by Blue Peter and watched some luge and ice hockey Winter Olympics events. We made Delia's gingerbread men biscuit recipe for the base of the biscuit.

I supplied gold and silver decorations and the boys got decorating. They loved making these medals!

I ordered a dot-to-dot book each in my last Amazon order and we also started those this afternoon. Peter was really good at his and completed half of the pictures. Harry's is more complicated with bigger numbers. 

Harry has also completed a Reading Eggs lesson and practised his cello. 

Geography jigsaw and WWI radio

Harry continued his writing from last night's Beavers session before we went out this morning. He said he wants to make some robots at the modelling session after half term and he wrote about what the robots might do. Peter did some of his Kumon tracing book and seems to be getting more confident holding a pen.

Harry also finished his Geopuzzle Europe jigsaw. This is a great puzzle, with pieces shaped like the countries and I may get the world version this year. We talked about Russia, as we have been watching some Winter Olympics. He could identify the UK, France, Italy and Spain.

We started thinking about the 100 year anniversary of the start of World War I today at our group session. We played some BBC school radio, including drama/movement and learning songs from the start of the war.

Peter can be quite disruptive during long listening activities so I brought some separate things for him to do, with another 3 year old boy. We read The Snowy Day and did some themed counting, cutting, line drawing and phonics. We then went to join in with songs and this seemed to work well. It is actually snowing here tonight so that was a well timed theme! 

After snack time, Harry coloured a Winter Olympics themed picture from Activity Village, showing the outline of Russia and they both made fire engines and helicopters from card. I also read a book of Michael Rosen poems, which Peter was laughing at lots.

We were all very tired at home after lunch. Peter STILL has a cold and I now have it too so we went upstairs to rest. Harry listened to Prince Caspian and I read to Peter for an hour in bed. Harry also read us Mountain Rescue, an Oxford Reading Tree book.

We all listened to the potato episode of the BBC playtime podcast and played with some Lego after this. Harry had his gymnastics class at 5pm. I read to Peter for half of the session and he played games on the iPad for the second half.

Science activities and beads

We had a fun morning today with our friends from French doing some science activities. Another mum brought Petri dishes and we swabbed a variety of things to add so that we can observe the growth of bacteria from them. We also read this book as a group which was interesting and quite in-depth.

We looked at mixtures too. We observed oil floating on water, salt sinking and foam floating on the oil. We talked about this in terms of using foam to put out fuel fires instead of water. Miriam also demonstrated how a fire needs air by burning a candle covered with a glass jug. When the flame had used up all the air in the jug it went out.

We also looked at ink separating into different colours and made butter by shaking double cream in a jar, forcing the blobs of fat to join together to form butter.

The children all had a good outdoor play in the park too before lunch.

At home, Harry and Peter threaded beads into bracelets and we watched Blue Peter from last week, featuring the Winter Olympics. Harry wants to make the medal biscuits they demonstrated, so we will do that this week.

Harry went to Beavers tonight too. They started working on their imagination badge by writing an imaginative poem or story. Harry's writing and spelling wasn't great, so I won't photograph it as it is hardly legible, but I loved the use of imagination. This was his story about the future: 

 I am going to be a scientist and make a shuttle and not move house. I love you. It is going to have turbo boosters and will explore mars and find moon rocks and volcanoes and deserts. It will be kind and helpful. The end.

He said he added the kind and helpful part as that is part of the Beaver promise. He was really proud to come home and show me! After half term they will be making models, which he will enjoy.

A birthday party, Chinese New Year and garden play

We have had a busy and fun weekend. Harry had his cello class yesterday and they played their longest piece yet, which we have brought home to practise for the two week half term holiday. He played it for us before bed today.

We then rushed off to a birthday party for one of Harry's friends, who we met through NCT antenatal classes (so they have been friends since birth). The party was in the flowrider at one of the local swimming pools. Harry seemed to enjoy it when he was doing it and managed to stay on the board for a long time, but he only wanted one turn so he just watched for the rest of the time. I was impressed he did it at all as he doesn't like being splashed! We went back for lunch to the birthday house. Stuart took Peter out to the Centre for Life while we were out and we all met back at home for tea.

We went into town today for the Chinese New Year celebrations in Chinatown. Harry and Peter loved the fairground rides, candy floss, throwing firecrackers on the ground and eating satay chicken skewers for lunch. There was also some traditional Chinese dancing and a lion and dragon dance. It was really cold and windy so we didn't last long and needed hot chocolates with some Winter Olympics TV when we got home! The boys have enjoyed the events we have seen so far, including the spectacular jumps in the snowboard slopestyle and the speed of the luge today.

They seemed to regain their energy and played in the garden afterwards. Peter's bubble gun made a swirling mass of bubbles in the wind! They also drew with outdoor chalks.

Harry read his new Lego reading book twice this weekend and has done lots of jigsaws in his bedroom. I think Peter is getting to the end of his cold and I am thankful as he has been very grumpy and difficult!

Park and cello with friends

We have had a great couple of days. The children all had a fantastic time in the playground after French yesterday. They have missed being outdoors in a very wet week so they made the most of it and ended up playing an involved game with rocks, pretend dynamite and diamonds. We all ended up bringing some rocks home too!

We have listened to four chapters of the BBC learning Wind in the Willows podcast now and are all enjoying it. We also watched a programme on iPlayer called The Burrowers, which was really interesting - it was aimed at children and looked at how our native burrowing animals live and included moles, badgers and water voles, all animals from Wind in the Willows. It was a bit of a nostalgia trip for me too, as it was presented by Chris Packham, of The Really Wild Show from my childhood! 

We spent a nice morning with friends today, who also home educate and do the same music classes at The Sage. Harry took his cello and played some pieces with two other boys on cello and viola.

Harry has also been doing Reading Eggs and spellings. He had his enjoy-a-ball class this afternoon, while Peter and I watched Alphablocks and played a new app on the iPad involving counting and recognising numbers to 10.

Maths secret code activity and music

I prepared a secret code maths activity for Harry last night which he completed today. I saw the idea on the No Time for Flashcards blog (I have used several ideas from there recently!). This was a great way to consolidate his maths learning - I included doubles, halves, quarters, odds and evens as well as all four usual functions. He did this at lunch time while Peter had a nap. I will do this again with some shorter, quicker messages too and I will be able to prepare some very simple ones for Peter later this year, for some secret code learning sessions! 

It had been a very tired start to the day before this. Peter has a bad and lingering cold and was very miserable, so I realised we were not going to get the work I had planned for this morning done and abandoned it. Harry was tired too and was happy listening to audio books for over an hour (he is listening to his favourite Narnia books again - Prince Caspian at the moment) so I sat in my bed with Peter and read books. This was just what they both needed today.

We had a FaceTime call with my mum and Harry very proudly showed her his Beavers badge. He also played his cello for her. Peter liked showing her his Chinese dragon head and tail.

Peter did some counting after his nap. I set out some number sheets and asked him to put the correct number of Lego men on each. 

Peter and I listened to the BBC Learning Let's Move podcast after this. He wanted to do the Jack Frost one we have done before and we both enjoyed the jumping and dancing round activity. I love these podcasts. They are great for burning off some energy indoors and for listening skills.

We have also finished the Chinese dragons from yesterday. We folded some card into a concertina for Peter's and Harry wove two colours together for his body. They played with these this afternoon, roaring at each other!

Harry and I played trilemma while Peter had his bath. We played a timed 5 minutes each where we tried to get as many counters on the board as possible. We both really like this game and he has learnt lots of maths vocabulary from it. He can now read and answer the questions based on multiples and some of the square number ones too.

I read to Peter while Harry had his bath. We have this new CD I bought from The Sage last week which we have been playing at bedtime this week when the lights are turned off and it has had an amazing effect on Harry. 

He has always found it really hard to switch off at bedtime, no matter how tired he is and sometimes takes over an hour to get to sleep. All week, he has been lying completely still and quiet and going to sleep as soon as the music finishes and sometimes before! 

I have downloaded some new music too to play during the day - A Tale of Two Cellos. I think it's nice for Harry to hear cello music as it's the instrument he is playing and they both enjoy classical music as well as many other kinds of music.

More Chinese New Year activities

We spent this morning at our group session where we did some Chinese New Year activities. We watched a video of the Zodiac race and worked out which animal we are. We also watched a video showing counting to ten in mandarin, before each being given a number and trying to put ourselves in the correct order. The children did really well with this! 

We read and talked about some Chinese proverbs, pandas and facts about China, before having Chinese snacks. These were not incredibly popular, except for the chocolate dipped pretzel sticks! 

We really enjoyed craft time today and made Chinese lanterns and dragons. We will finish the dragons tomorrow by making them a bendy body, as they needed to dry.

The boys were very tired when we got home so we read after lunch then Peter had a nap and Harry and I listened to audio books for half an hour and built some Lego.

Harry had gymnastics class at 5pm and really enjoyed going on the trampoline and rings. I read books to Peter for half of the session then he played some games on the iPad with his friend whose big brother also does gymnastics.