Bat Camp

Our last home ed camp of the summer was Bat Camp.

We learnt about nocturnal creatures,

made moth lure from molasses, sugar, mashed banana and coke which the kids placed on strategic tree stumps and fence posts (you use a red light to view them which is just a torch covered in red plastic),

set up a moth trap (and spent the next morning identifying the types caught - there were 18 in the trap across 8 species - before releasing them back into the wild),

discussed how bat boxes differ from bird boxes,

played 'hunting' games where you had to use just your sense of sound to try and catch your prey and another focussed on your sense of smell,

and stayed up very late to watch for bats - Rose was super excited because she spotted six.

Tis that time of year....

.... when we go on the home ed camps, our first this year was the craft group camp where we worked on some Viking weaving.

These are the instructions for Viking Cord Weaving 

The girls loved it and were to be found weaving all weekend - except when they made some time to practice their photography

Mary Anning

We managed to get away to London prior to Easter and enjoy the relatively quiet time to explore the museums

The girls favourite exhibit was on Mary Anning (they studied her a while ago when we did 'Stone Girl, Bone Girl' from Picture Book Explorers) while they were impressed with seeing the fossils she found, they were more impressed with the picture of her with her dog.

It always makes me smile to see them loving to learn.

Knights and Castles Activity day

Our local Home Ed group ran a Knights and Castles activity day.

There was plenty of dressing up,






including a reenactor who took the kids through their marching paces,







learning all about motte and bailey castles with play doh,





firing painted sponges at a castle using two different types of catapults



and lots and lots of castle toys : )

WW2 Evacuation Activity

Our Home Ed group arranged an activity at Bankfield Museum where the children had to pretend to be evacuees.

In their first session they met their billeting officer and she checked the children (Sunflower's finger nails were too long but everyone else passed inspection), discussed what an evacuee's suitcase needed to contain,

explored toys from the 1940s

and assigned them to their billets - she had a problem with the girls as all four wanted to stay together and most people didn't have room for them, eventually they agreed to share a bed and she was able to send them to the Reverends home where they would receive a uniform and be expected to do housework - Rose was most annoyed and when she wrote her postcard home, she was not happy that she had to be a maid. She also discussed rationing with them and showed a weeks worth of food.

The second half of the session was spent with an Air Raid warden, he discussed how to use our gas masks, what to do in an air raid and how to prepare for a blackout - including the correct headlight covers for your car or bike. 

The kids also got to handle the various gas masks and bits of shrapnel.

There were four activity stations: building a Morrison Shelter,

dressing up as a Home Guard, 

learning to be a nurse 

and manning the Fire Brigade where they learnt how to work a stirrup pump and forming a human bucket chain.

Afician Drumming

We had an African Drumming session last week. Our drummer was from Senegal and bought  all the drums and instruments with him.

They started by explaining how to drum - the outside makes a high noise and the middle a deep bass noise. After practicing they learnt a couple of tunes,

played a few rounds 

and finished by learning some traditional dances.

In the afternoon they had access to various worksheets to learn about Africa.