Fill My Eyes With Light!

Fill My Eyes With Light!

New home to click on above! 

Hadiths of the Fly

Ooo, er! What about that then! 

1260.pdf (application/pdf Object)

 
Well, as boring and controversial as this topic may be, it is refreshing to see that research is now finally shifting focus to the medium of television rather than just the content.

There are so many books worth reading on this topic, such as ‘Amusing Ourselves to Death’  by Neil Postman and others.
But what about Orwell’s ‘1984′ and Huxley’s ‘Brave New World’ too - are we so arrogant to think that we are above this!?!

 
and why are we *so* obsessed with research and statistics rather than common sense!?

I mean, research is good, don’t get me wrong, but when we lose sight of the common sense that makes people wary when a ‘new invention’ comes on the market, then we have lost our human connection imo. People consume ’soma’ daily without ever questioning, and even worse than that, we turn away from the unwelcome pricks to our conscience that awake the possibility that our lifestyle needs some amending.

Baby steps, baby steps in the right direction…

Holistic Educator: Storytelling

 Everybody can benefit from learning a little more about storytelling! Stories have been enjoyed since time began and can be wondrous moments in time! I note that my eldest, who is not interested in reading, will quite happily narrate incredible tales to his younger siblings masha’Allah. After a recent discussion I am moving towards asking him to tell us a story rather than my previous invitation to ‘read’ us a story from his mind. Language, eh!

And I hope that I will set a better example of storytelling from now on too.

 
If you are interested, then go find out the mechanics at the above link, or just dive in and dream a story to life…. 

Envirolet Buzz | Composting Toilet Blog: Yurt Toilet

 Cool! And they come in PINK!

Sort of ironically, they know far more than what we are ‘writing up’. I’m not sure how many children could get to First Grade and not have a good grasp of number in particular. In spite of my being numerically challenged, everyday life is full of mathematics, (and language of course). But I really like to have this creative expression of the foundations of ‘knowledge’ and learning. It feels steady and beautiful. And if it’s fun for me as an adult, (and many other adults too), I think it would be hard for any child to find it boring - even if they have been reading fluently for years to be honest… I don’t require perfection from them. Just an expression of what we have looked at. Button Family!

This is fun!

The main problem with blogging for me, apart from my technological incompetence, is that I forget what we did every day! It is quite amazing how many things the children do that make me go ‘ooo’ and ‘ahh’, and yet those moments pass and nothing can actually keep them forever as they were - not pictures, not blogging, not raw memory, as we have incredible minds which manipulate, (for better or worse), everything that we experience. 

For me that emphasises the fact that we can only reap the richness of life and it’s experiences by living in the moment and being open to what this moment is bringing us. From my moments of angst with dear children, I can fully appreciate the moments of joy!! From my moments of illness I realise the health I took for granted. There are constant in breaths and out breaths throughout our lives.

It really struck me at the eclipse how something momentous was happening, and yet all over the world people were scurrying around like ants, myself included, a ‘nothing’ in the scheme of things. Not that the eclipse was anything other than a continuing movement like our own. But rather a beautiful reminder of the Mover.

On to football, as I can remember this bit! Dh has been taking the children to watch football for a couple of months. Neither of us have ever been football fans I might ad, but Uncle K plays each week, and it has become a good way for them to go and have a run and for me to have an hour to myself. Yay! Anyway, today in the garden they set up goal, and it was sooo funny to watch them running around, making rules up and using the field language. The way we have our own kindergarten is wonderful, and I think that through homeschooling there is some extra closeness that they wouldn’t get if they were in school, seperated for five days a week with peers only, and absorbing all the agendas that playing with a two or four year old just isn’t cool!

I haven’t planned to do any formal lessons this week, (I should mention that I heavily unschool too.lol), so today was out in the garden for the most part - football as mentioned. Den building, path, bridge, well, making etc…they have their community finely planned, with box hedging, lavender and brick pathways to finish. It looks like a children’s garden for sure. I can’t even get into their house, though did manage to look through the window to see the fire place! Ahhh.

I meanwhile washed and hung things on the line outside, (love this time of year), and did all the usual homemaking stuff, (doesn’t that sound so much nicer to you than housework!?). Oh, and we looked at *yurts* - but boys prefer teepees. Which we will hopefully be making this year for our beans.

Also read in permaculture about a community allotment where they are pretty much self sufficient for the time they are on site - with compost toilets et al! Really need to source some materials this year to take down to our patch and do some building. At the moment it is barren and awaiting our energy and enthusiasm to wake it up!   Sooo much of our home ed actually revolves around the experience of growing things and just being ‘out there’. Waldorf ed emphasizes close up encounters in the early years as opposed to a more detatched ‘viewing’ on life. I love this aspect. Example would be watching the eclipse directly rather than seeing the details through a telescope - the latter is brought in later years.

And finally we tidied like crazy as we were expecting visitors, and it feels lovely!